Physicists from MIPT have predicted the existence of transparent composite media with unusual optical properties. Using graphics card based simulations, scientists studied regular volume structures composed of two dielectrics with close parameters, and found that the optical properties of these structures differ from both those of natural crystals and artificial periodic composites, which are currently…
Russian Physicists Measure The Loss Of Dark Matter Since The Birth Of The Universe
Scientists from MIPT, the Institute for Nuclear Research (INR) of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and Novosibirsk State University (NSU) have discovered that the proportion of unstable particles in the composition of dark matter in the days immediately after the Big Bang was no more than 2%-5%. Their study has been published in Physical Review D.…
X-ray Pulsars Fade as Propeller Effect Sets In
An international team of astrophysicists including Russian scientists from the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), MIPT, and Pulkovo Observatory of RAS has detected an abrupt decrease of pulsar luminosity following giant outbursts. The phenomenon is associated with the so-called “propeller effect,” which was predicted more than 40 years ago. However,…
Scientists Come Up with Light-Driven Motors to Power Nanorobots of the Future
Scientists from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT), Semenov Institute of Chemical Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences (ICP RAS), and Chuiko Institute of Surface Chemistry of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (ISC NASU) have proposed a model nanosized dipole photomotor based on the phenomenon of light-induced charge redistribution. Triggered…
UV Light Improves Smartphone Cameras
Photodetectors, which are used in a wide range of systems and devices from smartphones to space stations, are typically only sensitive to light within a certain narrow bandwidth. This presents numerous challenges to product developers. Together with their colleagues from China and Saudi Arabia, scientists at MIPT have found a way to address this. According…
Scientists Discover What Extraordinary Compounds May Be Hidden Inside Uranus, Neptune
Using computer modeling, chemists from MIPT and Skoltech (the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology) have found out which molecules may be present in the interiors of Uranus, Neptune, and the icy satellites of the giant planets. The scientists discovered that at high pressures, which are typical for the interiors of such planets, exotic molecular…
‘Sniffer Plasmons’ Could Detect Explosives
Physicists from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) have found that the two-dimensional form of carbon, known as graphene, might be the ideal material for manufacturing plasmonic devices capable of detecting explosive materials, toxic chemicals, and other organic compounds based on a single molecule, says an article published in Physical Review B. Plasmons…
Scientist Explains Sulfur Behavior in Venus Atmosphere
The beautiful dark stripes on ultraviolet images of Venus’s disc are in no way connected with the crystalline sulfur particles in its atmosphere – the ultraviolet is absorbed by another substance. This has been proven by data obtained from the first ever model of the distribution of sulfur in Venus’s gaseous envelope which has been…
“Smoothed” Light Will Help Search For Earth’s Twins
Physicists of MIPT (Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology) and the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences developed optical technology for the “correction” of light coming from distant stars, which will significantly improve the “seeing” of telescopes and therefore will enable us to directly observe exoplanets as Earth-twins. Their work has been…
Physicists Develop a Cooling System for the Processors of the Future
Researchers from MIPT have found a solution to the problem of the overheating of active plasmonic components for high-speed data transfer in the optoelectronic microprocessors of the future. These will be able to function tens of thousands of times faster than the microprocessors currently in use today. In the paper, published in ACS Photonics, the researchers…
New Method for Synthesis of Ultrahard Fullerite
Researchers from the Technological Institute for Superhard and Novel Carbon Materials in Troitsk, MIPT, MISiS, and MSU have developed a new method for the synthesis of an ultrahard material that exceeds diamond in hardness. An article recently published in the journal Carbon describes in detail a method that allows for the synthesis of ultrahard fullerite,…
Researchers Develop Force Sensor from Carbon Nanotubes
A group of researchers from Russia, Belarus and Spain, including MIPT professor Yury Lozovik, have developed a microscopic force sensor based on carbon nanotubes. The device is described in an article published in the journal Computational Materials Science and is also available as a preprint. The researchers proposed using two nanotubes, one of which is a long cylinder…
Researchers Observe Quantum Superconductor-Metal Transition & Superconducting Glass
The article “Collapse of superconductivity in a hybrid tin–grapheme Josephson junction array’” (authors: Zheng Han, Adrien Allain, Hadi Arjmandi-Tash,Konstantin Tikhonov, Mikhail Feigelman, Benjamin Sacépé,Vincent Bouchiat, published in Nature Physics on March 30, 2014, DOI:10.1038/NPHYS2929) presents the results of the first experimental study of the graphene-based quantum phase transition of the “superconductor-to-metal” type, i.e. transformation of…