crystalline solids

Honing in on graphene electronics with infrared synchrotron radiation

harminka — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 11:58:20 -0500

Graphene is the two-dimensional crystalline form of carbon: a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in hexagons, like a sheet of chicken wire with an atom at each nexus. As free-standing objects, such two-dimensional crystals were believed impossible to create -- even to exist -- until physicists at the University of Manchester actually made graphene in 2004.

New clues to how proteins dissolve and crystallize

harminka — Tue, 13 May 2008 08:13:40 -0500

In the late 19th century the Czech scientist Franz Hofmeister observed that some salts (ionic compounds) aided the solution of proteins in egg white, some caused the proteins to destabilize and precipitate, and others ranged in activity between these poles.

Gigantic respiration of crystalline solids

harminka — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 03:53:47 -0500

Previously, only amorphous polymer materials approached such levels of performance. On the other hand, these "gigantic respiration"Â and their respiration, which takes place at constant overall shape, is reversible. This discovery, of interest for numerous industrial applications, is published in the journal Science on March 30, 2007.