Category Archives: STEM

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics

Engineers Build Supercomputer Using Raspberry Pi, Lego

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The team is wanting to see “Iridis-Pi” become an inspiration for students to enable them “to apply high-performance computing and data handling techniques to tackle complex engineering and scientific challenges.”

via Engineers Build Supercomputer Using Raspberry Pi, Lego – ParityNews.com: …Because Technology Matters.

Howto is here.

Steps to make a Raspberry Pi Supercomputer

The steps to make a Raspberry Pi supercomputer can be downloaded here: Raspberry Pi Supercomputer (PDF).

You can also follow the steps here Raspberry Pi Supercomputer (html).

Using ultraviolet light to fabricate thin flexible electronics

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A new method for making metal oxide devices at much lower temperatures uses ultraviolet (UV) irradiation. Yong-Hoon Kim and colleagues used UV light to chemically activate metal particles in a chemical solution; the new metal oxide molecules condensed out of the solution, forming a thin semiconducting film. The process can be performed at room temperature—far lower than the 350° temperatures typical of metal oxide fabrication.

via Using ultraviolet light to fabricate thin flexible electronics | Ars Technica.

The high temperatures are the problem. 350°C is above the melting point of most flexible, transparent substances (e.g. plastics), and real electronic devices need a substrate to give them shape. It doesn’t matter how thin or transparent metal oxide devices are if they must be deposited on thick, opaque, rigid materials.

ISRO successfully launches PSLV-C21

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Describing the mission as a milestone in the nation’s space capabilities, he said the launch was “testimony to the commercial competitiveness of the Indian space industry and is a tribute to Indian innovation and ingenuity”.

A beaming ISRO chief K. Radhakrishnan told the post-launch media conference that with today’s successful mission the agency has launched 62 satellites, one space recovery module and 37 rockets, making it a grand 100.

via The Hindu : News / National : ISRO successfully launches PSLV-C21.

Penn Researchers Make First All-optical Nanowire Switch

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Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have made an important advance in this frontier of photonics, fashioning the first all-optical photonic switch out of cadmium sulfide nanowires. Moreover, they combined these photonic switches into a logic gate, a fundamental component of computer chips that process information.

via Penn Researchers Make First All-optical Nanowire Switch | Penn News.

The researchers were able to measure the intensity of the light coming out of the end of the second nanowire and to show that the switch could effectively represent the binary states used in logic devices.

Quantum test pricks uncertainty

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Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, as it came to be known later, started as an assertion that when trying to measure one aspect of a particle precisely, say its position, experimenters would necessarily “blur out” the precision in its speed.

That raised the spectre of a physical world whose nature was, beyond some fundamental level, unknowable.

via BBC News – Quantum test pricks uncertainty.

Photons can be prepared in pairs which are inextricably tied to one another, in a delicate quantum state called entanglement, and the weak measurement idea is to infer information about them as they pass, before and after carrying out a formal measurement.

What the team found was that the act of measuring did not appreciably “blur out” what could be known about the pairs.

TSMC plans 450mm wafers by 2018

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The 450mm wafers would help solve the problem of rising costs in making advanced chips, allowing TSMC to provide affordable 10 nanometer chips with FinFET transistors for customers, J.K. Wang (王建光), vice president of TSMC’s operation in charge of 300mm factories, told a media briefing arranged by semiconductor industry association SEMI.

via TSMC plans 450mm wafers by 2018 – Taipei Times.

Chipmakers can get 2.5 times more chips from a 450mm wafer than from a 300mm wafer.

LG produces the first flexible cable-type lithium-ion battery

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LG Chem’s battery starts with thin strands of copper wire, which are coated with a nickel-tin (Ni-Sn) alloy to create the anode. These strands are twisted into a yarn, and then wrapped tightly around a 1.5mm-diameter rod. The rod is removed, leaving a strong spring. Next, aluminium wire is wrapped around the spring, and then the whole caboodle is dragged through a slurry of lithium cobalt oxide, which coats the aluminium wire and becomes the cathode. Finally, the anode-cathode spring is wrapped in a protective outer coating, and then an electrolyte is poured down the middle of the hollow spring to create a battery.

via LG produces the first flexible cable-type lithium-ion battery | ExtremeTech.

Flat lens offers a perfect image

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Operating at telecom wavelengths (i.e., the range commonly used in fiber-optic communications), the new device is completely scalable, from near-infrared to terahertz wavelengths, and simple to manufacture. The results have been published online in the journal Nano Letters.

via Flat lens offers a perfect image — Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

“In the future we can potentially replace all the bulk components in the majority of optical systems with just flat surfaces,” says lead author Francesco Aieta, a visiting graduate student from the Università Politecnica delle Marche in Italy. “It certainly captures the imagination.”

 

Shor’s algorithm

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If a quantum computer with a sufficient number of qubits were to be constructed, Shor’s algorithm could be used to break public-key cryptography schemes such as the widely used RSA scheme. RSA is based on the assumption that factoring large numbers is computationally infeasible. So far as is known, this assumption is valid for classical (non-quantum) computers; no classical algorithm is known that can factor in polynomial time. However, Shor’s algorithm shows that factoring is efficient on a quantum computer, so a sufficiently large quantum computer can break RSA. It was also a powerful motivator for the design and construction of quantum computers and for the study of new quantum computer algorithms. It has also facilitated research on new cryptosystems that are secure from quantum computers, collectively called post-quantum cryptography.

via Shor’s algorithm – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.