We recently sat down with the University of Iowa’s Johna Leddy, an established researcher in electrochemical power sources and a highly respected mentor to the students of the Leddy Lab. Listen as we talk about the energy infrastructure, Dr. Leddy’s career in academia, how to make the world a better place, and more!
Listen below and download this episode and others for free through the iTunes Store, SoundCloud, or our RSS Feed.
Nanoporous gold features high effective surface area, tunable pore size, and high electrical conductivity and compatibility with traditional fabrication techniques.
Image: Ryan Chen/LLNL
Researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the University of California, Davis have recently published a paper showing that covering an implantable neural electrode with nanoporus gold could potentially eliminate the risk of scar tissue forming over the electrode’s surface.
Two former ECS member, Erkin Seker and Juergen Biener, were among the researchers involved with this development.
This from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory:
The team demonstrated that the nanostructure of nanoporous gold achieves close physical coupling of neurons by maintaining a high neuron-to-astrocyte surface coverage ratio. Close physical coupling between neurons and the electrode plays a crucial role in recording fidelity of neural electrical activity.
Researchers were able to deform the molybdenum disulfide without breaking it.
Image: Nano Letters
Many labs have had their eye on molybdenum disulfide recently due to its promising semiconducting properties. Rice University has also turned its attention toward this 2D material and its interesting sandwich structure. During their studies, the researchers have concluded that under certain conditions, molybdenum disulfide can transform from the consistency of peanut brittle to that of taffy.
According to their research, the scientists state that when exposed to sulfur-infused gas at the right temperature and pressure, molybdenum disulfide takes on the qualities of plastic. This development has the potential to have a high impact in the world of materials science.
The structure of the molybdenum disulfide is similar to a sandwich, with layers of sulfur above and below the molybdenum atoms. When the two sheets join at different angles “defective” arrangements—or dislocations—are formed.
Each doll housed a phonograph that was activated by a crank on the doll’s back.
Image: John Reed/National Park Service
Beth Schademann, ECS Publications Specialist, recently came across an NPR article regarding one of ECS’s most famous members and his slightly terrifying, obscure invention.
We talk quite a bit about Thomas Edison here at ECS. Edison happens to be one of our earliest and most recognizable members, not to mention a prolific inventor and entrepreneur.
While Edison is most known for his inventions related to the light bulb and phonograph, he also created the world’s first talking doll back in 1890.
The dolls still exist, but it wasn’t possible to hear the recordings on their tiny phonographs until now. Although, we may have been better off if we never heard these creepy renditions of classic children’s songs.
Edison wasn’t trying to take over the doll market with these toys, he was instead attempting to market his new wax cylinder phonograph for people to use in their homes.
If you also find these recording a bit unsettling, you’re not alone—Edison himself even found them unpleasant. After the dolls flopped in the market due to their high price ($200 in today’s currency) and creepy nature, Edison stopped manufacturing them after only two months.
A curator from the Thomas Edison National Historical Park states that after the dolls went under, Edison refereed to them as his “little monsters.”
One of the world’s strongest natural materials has met one of the strongest artificial materials.
Researchers from the University of Trento, Italy conduced an experiment where they sprayed spiders—producers of naturally strong silk—with carbon-based graphene. Why? Curiosity, of course—the backbone of much great science.
From the experiment, the researchers found that some spiders produced silk that was 3.5 times tougher and stronger than the best naturally produced silk.
While CNT alignment is still not perfect, it will now be able to be scaled up for large-scale production.
Source: North Carolina State University
A new process called “microcombing” has been developed to created ultra-strong and highly conductive carbon nanotubes (CNTs).
The films produced from the microcombing technique could have practical applications in improving electronics and aerospace technology.
“It’s a simple process and can create a lightweight CNT film, or ‘bucky paper,’ that is a meter wide and twice as strong as previous such films—it’s even stronger than CNT fibers,” said Yuntian Zhu, Distinguished Professor of Material Science and Engineering at NC State.
This new development will lead to accelerated improvements in the materials’ uniformity, stability, and efficiency.
Source: University of Washington
In light of the growth in solar energy research, scientists have been directing a lot of attention toward perovskites. The materials’ wide range of use and potential to outpace silicon-based semiconductors in the field of solar cells makes perovskites an interesting area of research with great potential.
Researchers from the University of Washington, in conjunction with the University of Oxford, have discovered a new quality to perovskites that could help engineer a better solar cell.
The researchers have shown in their research that, contrast to popular belief, the perovskites are uniform in composition. The materials actually contain flaws that can be engineered to improve solar devices even further.
“In that short amount of time, the ability of these materials to convert sunlight directly into electricity is approaching that of today’s silicon-based solar cells, rivaling technology that took 50 years to develop,” said Dane deQuilettes, a University of Washington doctoral student. “But we also suspect there is room for improvement.”
New issues of ECS Transactions have now been published from the 2014 ECS & SMEQ Joint International Meeting. This meeting was co-sponsored by The Electrochemical Society and was held in October 2014 in Cancun, Mexico.
Volume 64 : Issues 1 to 47 are now available.
For more information on ECS Transactions, please visit ECST. Issues are continuously updated and all full-text papers will be published here as soon as they are available.
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ECS will be offering three Short Courses at the 227th ECS Meeting this May in Chicago. Taught by industry experts, the small class size creates an excellent opportunity for personalized instruction helping both novices and experts advance their technical expertise and knowledge.
Short Course #2
Fundamentals of Electrochemistry – Basic Theory and Thermodynamic Methods
Jamie Noël, Instructor
This course covers the basic theory and application of electrochemical science. It is targeted toward people with a physical sciences or engineering background who have not been trained as electrochemists, but who want to add electrochemical methods to their repertoire of research approaches. There are many fields in which researchers originally approach their work from another discipline but then discover that it would be advantageous to understand and use some electrochemical methods to complement the work that they are doing. The course begins with a general, basic foundation of electrochemistry and uses it to develop the theory and experimental approaches to electrochemical problems of a thermodynamic nature. Read more.
About the Instructor
Dr. Jamie Noël is an established electrochemist and corrosion scientist. Throughout his career, he has worked on corrosion issues in the nuclear industry and entered into academia through his position as a research scientist and adjunct professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada. Dr. Noël assists in training and directing students, carrying out fundamental and applied electrochemistry research projects, and teaching electrochemistry at the graduate level. He uses electrochemical and other surface analytical techniques to study the corrosion of nuclear reactor components and nuclear waste management systems material. He continues to refine techniques that combine electrochemical measurements with neutron-based materials science techniques.
Registration for the short courses has been extended through the start of the meeting.
Engineers developed this one-material battery by sprinkling carbon (red) into each side of a new material (blue) that forms the electrolyte and both electrodes at the ends of the battery.
Source: Maryland NanoCenter
ECS student member Fudong Han and former member Chunsheng Wang have developed a novel solid state battery comprised of just one material that can both move and store electricity.
This new battery could prove to be revolutionary in the area of solid state batteries due to its incorporation of electrodes and electrolytes into a single material.
“Our battery is 600 microns thick, about the size of a dime, whereas conventional solid state batteries are thin films — forty times thinner. This means that more energy can be stored in our battery,” said Han, the first author of the paper and a graduate student in Wang’s group.
This from the University of Maryland:
The new material consists of a mix of sulfur, germanium, phosphorus and lithium. This compound is used as the ion-moving electrolyte. At each end, the scientists added carbon to this electrolyte to form electrodes that push the ions back and forth through the electrolyte as the battery charges and discharges. Like a little bit more sugar added at each end of a cookie-cream mixture, the carbon merely helps draw the electricity from side to side through the material.
