Batteries that charge faster and have greater capacity could boost portable electronic devices and electric cars. A new method to simultaneously test stress and strain in battery electrodes gives researchers a window into the mechanical, electrical and chemical forces within lithium-ion batteries. The method revealed an unexpected point of stress in the charging cycle, which … Read more
Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed a new method for making brighter and more efficient green light-emitting diodes (LEDs). Using an industry-standard semiconductor growth technique, they have created gallium nitride (GaN) cubic crystals grown on a silicon substrate that are capable of producing powerful green light for advanced solid-state lighting. “This … Read more
At the University of Illinois, an engineer teamed up with a veterinarian to test a bone cancer drug delivery system in animals bigger than the standard animal model, the mouse. They chose dogs – mammals closer in size and biology to humans – with naturally occurring bone cancers, which also are a lot like human … Read more
What’s good for crops is not always good for the environment. Nitrogen, a key nutrient for plants, can cause problems when it leaches into water supplies. University of Illinois engineers developed a model to calculate the age of nitrogen in corn and soybean fields, which could lead to improved fertilizer application techniques to promote crop … Read more
Smaller and faster has been the trend for electronic devices since the inception of the computer chip, but flat transistors have gotten about as small as physically possible. For researchers pushing for even faster speeds and higher performance, the only way to go is up. University of Illinois researchers have developed a way to etch … Read more
Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have demonstrated doping-induced tunable wetting and adhesion of graphene, revealing new and unique opportunities for advanced coating materials and transducers. “Our study suggests for the first time that the doping-induced modulation of the charge carrier density in graphene influences its wettability and adhesion,” explained SungWoo Nam, an … Read more
In an era of so many scientific and technological breakthroughs—advances in genome editing, the discovery of Higgs boson or the “God particle,” the launching of deep space satellites—two award-winning University of Illinois scientists have teamed up to re-introduce people to a remarkable 19th century lecture series about the candle. Yes, the deceptively simple candle. “There … Read more
Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have developed a new technique for extremely high speed photonic sensing of the mechanical properties of freely flowing particles using an opto-mechano-fluidic resonator (OMFR). This research potentially opens up completely new mechanical “axes of measurement” on micro/nanoparticles and bioparticles. “It is known that diseases such as cancers … Read more
A complicated orthopedic surgery performed recently at the College of Veterinary Medicine received assistance from the College of Engineering at the opposite end of the University of Illinois campus. On May 5, a young bald eagle in the care of the Wildlife Medical Clinic underwent a three-hour procedure to repair its left humerus, which had … Read more
The water going down the drain could help keep the lights on, according to a new study showing that reclaimed water – municipal wastewater that has been treated or cleaned – could be more efficient for cooling power plants than water taken from the local environment. University of Illinois professor of civil and environmental engineering … Read more