Science

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Monolithic perovskite/silicon tandem solar cell achieves record efficiency

Organic-inorganic perovskite materials are one of the biggest surprises in solar cell research. In just six years, the efficiency of perovskite solar cells has increased five-fold; moreover, perovskite solar cells can be manufactured from solution and be cost-effectively printed on large areas in the future.

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A cross-section through the tandem cell is shown by this SEM-image.

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3-D laser printing of whispering-gallery-mode microcavities

Whispering-Gallery-Mode (WGM) microcavities that confine light in a small volume with high quality (Q) factors and enhance interaction of light with matters inside the cavity have shown promising applications as an element for a variety of devices such as micro-lasers, micro-sensors, micro-filters, and thus are becoming the basic building blocks of integrated photonic systems. This leads to tremendous progress in the development of micro-scale high-Q microcavity processing technologies.

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These are microscope images of WGM microcavities fabricated by femtosecond laser 3-D processing.

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Australian scientists design a full-scale architecture for a quantum computer in silicon

Physicists at UNSW Australia and the University of Melbourne have designed a scalable 3-D silicon chip architecture based on single atom quantum bits, providing a blueprint to build operational quantum computers.

Scientists and engineers from the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology (CQC2T), headquartered at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), are leading the world in the race to develop a scalable quantum computer in silicon - a material well-understood and favoured by the trillion-dollar computing and microelectronics industry.

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Physicists mimic quantum entanglement with laser pointer to double data speeds

In a classic eureka moment, a team of physicists led by The City College of New York and including Herriot-Watt University and Corning Incorporated is showing how beams from ordinary laser pointers mimic quantum entanglement with the potential of doubling the data speed of laser communication.

Quantum entanglement is a phrase more likely to be heard on popular sci-fi television shows such as "Fringe" and "Doctor Who." Described by Albert Einstein as "spooky action at a distance," when two quantum things are entangled, if one is 'touched' the other will 'feel it,' even if separated by a great distance.

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Saturn's Geyser Moon Shines in Close Flyby Views

NASA's Cassini spacecraft has begun transmitting its latest images of Saturn's icy, geologically active moon Enceladus, acquired during the dramatic Oct. 28 flyby in which the probe passed about 30 miles (49 kilometers) above the moon's south polar region. The spacecraft will continue transmitting its data from the encounter for the next several days.

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Monolithic perovskite/silicon tandem solar cell achieves record efficiency

Organic-inorganic perovskite materials are one of the biggest surprises in solar cell research. In just six years, the efficiency of perovskite solar cells has increased five-fold; moreover, perovskite solar cells can be manufactured from solution and be cost-effectively printed on large areas in the future.

Perovskite with silicon: good team but difficult to combine

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Halloween Skies to Include Dead Comet Flyby

The large space rock that will zip past Earth this Halloween is most likely a dead comet that, fittingly, bears an eerie resemblance to a skull.

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NASA's K2 Finds Dead Star Vaporizing a Mini 'Planet'

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In this artist's conception, a tiny rocky object vaporizes as it orbits a white dwarf star. Astronomers have detected the first planetary object transiting a white dwarf using data from the K2 mission. Slowly the object will disintegrate, leaving a dusting of metals on the surface of the star.

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Borneo on Fire

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The worst forest fires in nearly two decades are burning out of control on Borneo, creating the thick blanket of smoke in this Oct. 14 image from NASA's MISR instrument.

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Manipulating wrinkles could lead to graphene semiconductors

Graphene has generally been described as a two-dimensional structure--a single sheet of carbon atoms arranged in a regular structure--but the reality is not so simple. In reality, graphene can form wrinkles which make the structure more complicated, potentially being applied to device systems. The graphene can also interact with the substrate upon which it is laid, adding further complexity.

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Schematic of the work The tip of the scanning tunneling microscope (in yellow-orange) is moved over the graphene and the nanowrinkle.

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