News from the NNI Community - Research Advances Funded by Agencies Participating in the NNI

New research by engineers at MIT, the University of Central Florida, the University of Texas at Austin, Brookhaven National Laboratory, and Hong Kong Polytechnic University could lead to batteries that can pack more power per pound and last longer, based on the long-sought goal of using pure lithium metal as one of the battery's two electrodes, the anode. To form the anode, the researchers developed a three-dimensional nanoarchitecture in the form of a honeycomb-like array of hexagonal tubes, partially infused with solid lithium metal. The hexagonal tubes are about 100 to 300 nanometers in diameter and tens of microns in height.

This article is an interview with Ashwin Shahani, an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at the University of Michigan, whose research has revealed that an intricate and beautiful set of nanoscale rods, sheets, and spirals forms spontaneously in cooling metal alloys. His research could lead to a new generation of lightweight alloys and optical products with properties superior to monolithic materials.

This article is an interview with Ashwin Shahani, an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at the University of Michigan, whose research has revealed that an intricate and beautiful set of nanoscale rods, sheets, and spirals forms spontaneously in cooling metal alloys. His research could lead to a new generation of lightweight alloys and optical products with properties superior to monolithic materials.

Scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory have discovered a new platform for quantum technologies by suspending two-dimensional crystals over pores in a slab of gold. This new approach may help develop new materials for secure communication and sensing technologies based on the unique laws of physics at the atomic level.

Scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory have discovered a new platform for quantum technologies by suspending two-dimensional crystals over pores in a slab of gold. This new approach may help develop new materials for secure communication and sensing technologies based on the unique laws of physics at the atomic level.

Researchers have, for the first time, created and imaged a novel pair of quantum dots – tiny islands (100 nanometers in diameter) of confined electric charge that act like artificial atoms. Such a ''coupled'' quantum dot could serve as a robust quantum bit, or qubit, the fundamental unit of information for a quantum computer.

Researchers have, for the first time, created and imaged a novel pair of quantum dots – tiny islands (100 nanometers in diameter) of confined electric charge that act like artificial atoms. Such a ''coupled'' quantum dot could serve as a robust quantum bit, or qubit, the fundamental unit of information for a quantum computer.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison have developed nanoparticles that, in the lab, can activate immune responses to cancer cells. If they are shown to work as well in the body as they do in the lab, the nanoparticles might provide an effective and more affordable way to fight cancer. They are cheaper to produce and easier to engineer than the antibodies that underlie current immunotherapies, which, as drugs, cost tens of thousands of dollars a month.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin–Madison have developed nanoparticles that, in the lab, can activate immune responses to cancer cells. If they are shown to work as well in the body as they do in the lab, the nanoparticles might provide an effective and more affordable way to fight cancer. They are cheaper to produce and easier to engineer than the antibodies that underlie current immunotherapies, which, as drugs, cost tens of thousands of dollars a month.

New cancer immunotherapies involve extracting a patient's T cells and genetically engineering them so they will recognize and attack tumors. But the alterations to the immune system immediately make patients very sick for a short period of time. Now, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have demonstrated a new engineering technique that, because it is less toxic to the T cells, could enable a different mechanism for altering the way they recognize cancer. The new technique involves ferrying messenger RNA across the T cell's membrane via a lipid-based nanoparticle, rather than using a modified HIV virus to rewrite the cell's DNA.