Electronic

Indium is one of the rarest metals on Earth, but it’s a key ingredient in ubiquitous electronic devices. Engineers have demonstrated a way to swap indium for graphene, which is made from common carbon, while retaining the same electronic properties.

Superconductivity occurs when electrons in a metal pair up. Scientists in Germany have now discovered that electrons can also group together into families of four, creating a new state of matter and potentially a new type of superconductivity.

E-waste is a major environmental hazard, full of valuable metals. Engineers at Rice University have now shown that precious metals and rare earth minerals can be recovered by flash-heating ground-up electronics with a zap of electricity.

Managing heat is a major challenge in electronics and engineering, and it’s controlled using materials that either conduct or insulate heat. A new material blurs that line by blocking heat in one direction but conducting it in another.

A team of engineers has given microchips a new ability – the power of flight. Inspired by wind-dispersed seeds, these “microfliers” are shaped like tiny propellers to catch the wind, and may be the smallest flying structures ever made by humans.

Widespread wireless charging could one day keep our devices juiced up indefinitely. A new breakthrough has been made in that direction, as researchers in Japan have developed a system that can turn a whole room into a wireless charger.

By combining miniaturized electronics with some origami-inspired fabrication, scientists have developed what they say is the smallest microsupercapacitor in existence. It's smaller than a speck of a dust but boasts a similar voltage to a AAA battery.

Electronics and batteries are vulnerable to very high or low temperatures, but a new thermal switch could help deal with both. Made from graphene foam, it can dynamically trap heat when it’s cold out or allow heat to escape when it gets too warm.

Over the last year or so, Sam Battle has been gathering together interesting tech and gadgetry from the past and musical curiosities of his own design for a collection known as This Museum Is (Not) Obsolete, which is now open for business.

Researchers have discovered a material that can switch between an insulator and a conductor freely, even at room temperature. The material, a compound of manganese and sulfide (MnS2), starts off as an insulator but becomes conductive under pressure.

Engineers have found a way to make liquid metals switch between reflective surfaces or those that scatter light. The transition only requires a small zap of electricity and could be used to make mirrors that can be switched on or off.

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.