Materials Sciences

Using building blocks that make up ordinary plastics, but putting them together in a whole new way, University of Michigan researchers have created a class of lightweight, rigid polymers they predict will be useful for storing hydrogen fuel. The work is described in today’s (Nov. 17) issue of the journal Science.

The trick to making the new materials, called covalent organic frameworks (COFs), was coaxing them to assume predictable crystal structures—something that never had b

Photorefractive organic polymer system functionalized with a nonlinear optical chromophore boronate derivative

Photoconducting polymers doped with nonlinear optical chromophores have emerged as efficient and inexpensive photorefractive (PR) materials. These materials show promise for applications in dynamic volume holography, image formation, optical processing, reversible data storage, correlation, etc.

Recently, PR polymer composites have gained a great amount of at

Microstructural characterization of BaTiO3 thin films prepared by RF-Magnetron sputtering using sintered targets from high energy ball milled powders

The electronic and optical characteristics of barium titanate (BT) ferroelectric ceramics are of great interest for industrial uses and when grown as thin films they can easily be integrated into modern circuitry. These thin films are commonly prepared by RF- magnetron sputtering using a commercially available BT target as the ma

Environmental groups around the world have been campaigning for years to replace lead-containing solders and protective layers on electronic components with non-hazardous metals and alloys. In response, the European Union (EU) will ban the use of lead (and five other hazardous substances) in all electrical and electronic equipment sold in EU nations starting in July 2006. U.S. manufacturers must comply with this requirement in order to market their products overseas.

However, pure ele

Potentially fatal side-effect may be preventable, new study suggests

Topoisomerase II inhibitors are among the most successful chemotherapy drugs used to treat human cancer. But a small percentage of patients treated with these agents recover from their initial malignancy only to develop a second cancer, leukemia.
Researchers at UC Davis Cancer Center have shed new light on this poorly understood process. In a study to be published in the Nov. 22 issue of the journal Leuke

Massive variations in electrical conductivity observed for amorphous carbon thin films

A great deal of work has been done into understanding the physical properties of amorphous carbon (a-C). These studies have found the relative ratio of different carbon phases strongly determines the physical properties of the material.

In this work, published in AZojomo*, by B. Rebollo-Plata, R. Lozada-Morales, R. Palomino-Merino, J. A. Dávila-PintLe, O. Portillo-Moreno, O. Zelaya