University of California
The brains of people with severe depression have lower levels of several related molecules that are key to the development, organization, growth and repair of the brain than the brains of people without the disease, or those with the bipolar form of depression, a new study finds. The discovery, which surprised researchers in the multi-university consortium that made it, suggests a whole new direction for understanding depression and developing new depression treatments. It may even help scientists understand how some antidepressant medications work in the brain to ease symptoms, and why there is wide variation in how depressed people respond to different antidepressants.
A University of California scientist working at Los Alamos National Laboratory and researchers from Northrop Grumman Space Technology have developed a novel method for generating electrical power for deep-space travel using sound waves. The traveling-wave thermoacoustic electric generator has the potential to power space probes to the furthest reaches of the Universe.
Scientists have recently grown a world record-length four-centimeter-long, single-wall carbon nanotube. Single-wall carbon nanotubes have a number of revolutionary uses, including being spun into fibers or yarns that are more than 10 times stronger than any current structural material. In addition to uses in lightweight, high-strength applications, these new long metallic nanotubes also will enable new types of nanoscale electro-mechanical systems such as micro-electric motors, nanoscale diodes, and nanoconducting cable for wiring micro-electronic devices.
Carnegie Mellon University's Rob A. Rutenbar is leading a national research team to develop a new, efficient silicon chip that may revolutionize the way humans communicate and have a significant impact on America's homeland security. Rutenbar, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Carnegie Mellon, working jointly with researchers at the University of California at Berkeley received a $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation to move automatic speech recognition from software into hardware. ''I can ask my cell phone to 'Call Mom,''' says Rutenbar, ''but I can't dictate a detailed email complaint to my travel agent or navigate a complicated Internet database by voice alone.''
Scientists have demonstrated a simple and industrially scaleable method for improving the current densities of superconducting coated conductors in magnetic field environments. The discovery has the potential to increase the already impressive carrying capacity of superconducting wires and tapes by as much as 200 to 500 percent in certain uses, like motors and generators, where high magnetic fields diminish current densities.
Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory have demonstrated a way to use the random fluctuations that exist naturally in all magnetic systems to perform magnetic resonance studies without disturbing the system's natural state. Conventional magnetic resonance techniques, such as those used in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines, require the excitation and absorption of specific radio-frequency waves by atoms in a magnetic field. These absorption patterns can be used to reveal molecular and magnetic structure. The find could pave the way for perturbation-free magnetic resonance imaging techniques that are useful in fields like nanotechnology and quantum information science where systems containing only a few atoms are becoming commonplace and their associated magnetic fluctuations play an increasingly dominant role.
California scientists have demonstrated the ability to detect the spin of a single electron in a standard silicon transistor. The advance could help facilitate the direct, rather than theoretical, study of the physics of electron spin decoherence, which is a critical step toward manipulating and monitoring the spin of a single electron. Decoherence is the process in which objects of the quantum world -- like electrons -- lose their wavelike characteristics by interacting with the surrounding environment. Electron spin control could be crucial for the creation of nanoscale electronics, the magnetic resonance imaging of single molecules and the development of quantum computers.
A significant breakthrough in the development of the highly prized semiconductor gallium nitride as a building block for nanotechnology has been achieved by a team of scientists with the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California at Berkeley. For the first time ever, the researchers have been able control the direction in which a gallium nitride nanowire grows. Growth direction is critical to determining the wire's electrical and thermal conductivity and other important properties.
Zirconium may not be a girl's best friend, but by squeezing the metal with roughly the same pressure needed to make diamonds, scientists at the University of California's Los Alamos National Laboratory made a pure glass that may prove nearly as valuable as real diamonds. The pure metallic glass formed by their high-pressure method holds promise for stronger, more stable materials for medical, sports and electronic products.
Organisms ranging from bacteria to humans navigate environments that can contain dangerously too little or too much oxygen. Yet, scientists know little about how animals sense oxygen levels around them. Researchers from the Berkeley and San Francisco campuses of the University of California have now discovered how the nematode C. elegans senses oxygen levels in order to steer clear of surrounding areas that are too low or too high in oxygen.
Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have found new ways of combining quantum dots and segmented nanorods into multiply branching forms and have applied new ways to calculate the electronic properties of these nanostructures, whose dimensions are measured in billionths of a meter.
For the past several years, a team of University of California astrophysicists working at Los Alamos National Laboratory have been using a cluster of roughly 300 computer processors to model some of the most intriguing aspects of the Universe. Called the Space Simulator, this de facto supercomputer has not only proven itself to be one of the fastest supercomputers in the world, but has also demonstrated that modeling and simulation of complex phenomena, from supernovae to cosmology, can be done on a fairly economical basis.
University of California scientists working at Los Alamos National Laboratory with a colleague from Sandia National Laboratories have developed a new method for exciting light emission from nanocrystal quantum dots. The discovery provides a way to supply energy to quantum dots without wires, and paves the way for a potentially wider use of tunable nanocrystalline materials in a variety of novel light-emitting technologies ranging from electronic displays to solid-state lighting and electrically pumped nanoscale lasers.
Some slow, cold visitors stopped by Los Alamos National Laboratory last week, and their arrival could prove a godsend to physicists seeking a better theory of everything. Researchers working at the University of California's Los Alamos Neutron Science Center and eight other member institutions of an international collaboration took a giant step toward their goal of constructing the most intense source of ultra-cold neutrons in the world, measuring ultra-cold neutron production in their new source for the first time.
In a development that brings the promise of mass production to nanoscale devices, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientists have transformed carbon nanotubes into conveyor belts capable of ferrying atom-sized particles to microscopic worksites. By applying a small electrical current to a carbon nanotube, they moved indium particles along the tube like auto parts on an assembly line. Their research lays the groundwork for the high-throughput construction of atomic-scale optical, electronic, and mechanical devices that will power the burgeoning field of nanotechnology.
