Electronic

Silicon is vital to all of the electronics that our modern world is built on. Now, research led by the Carnegie Institution for Science has developed a way to create a new form of silicon with a unique hexagonal structure.

Engineers at Columbia University have developed the smallest single-chip system ever created, which can be implanted with a hypodermic needle to measure temperature inside the body, and possibly much more.

Graphene just keeps getting weirder. Engineers at ETH Zurich have now managed to tweak the overachieving material so that some parts of a flake can be an electrical insulator while other areas act as a superconductor, just nanometers apart.

Scientists in the US have introduced a new player to the world of 2D materials in the form of an ultra-thin, ultra-strong material they've dubbed borophane, which they see one day finding use in advanced forms of electronics.

Graphene has a lot of useful properties, but magnetism isn’t usually one of them. Now, researchers have managed to induce an “artificial magnetic texture” in graphene, which could have major implications for the emerging field of spintronics.

Diamond is a famously hard material, but now scientists have managed to stretch it further than ever before. Why? Stretching nanoscale samples changes their electronic and optical properties, which could open up a new world of diamond devices.

Engineers have created one of the smallest memory storage devices ever, made out of a 2D material measuring 1 nanometer square. The device works on the movements of single atoms, paving the way for memory systems with incredible information density.

Some advanced electronic devices only function at extremely cold temperatures. Now engineers at NIST have developed a tiny cryogenic thermometer that uses a new mechanism to keep an eye on these sensitive instruments without taking up much room.

Engineers at EPFL have created a new computer chip that can both process and store data in the same circuit. It’s made using a two-dimensional material called molybdenum disulfide, paving the way for smaller and more energy efficient electronics.

Researchers at the University of Washington have developed a tiny new sensor that can be carried around on a small drone or even the back of an insect – and then dropped on demand to track the environment for years at a time.

Diamond is an electrical insulator, but maybe not always. A new study calculated that deforming diamond nano-needles would change their conductivity from an insulator to a semiconductor to a highly conductive metal – and back again at will.

Silicon has been the material of choice for electronics for decades, but it’s beginning to bump up against efficiency limits. Now engineers at UC Berkeley have created metallic graphene nanoribbons, which can make wires for all-carbon electronics.