Physics

A research group led by Professor Yoshio Teki of the Osaka Metropolitan University Graduate School of Engineering has succeeded in developing a new pentacene derivative that is more than 100 times more photostable than TIPS-pentacene, a photostable pentacene derivative. Additionally, the team has further clarified the ultrafast excited state dynamics in this system. In the pentacene moiety of this system, we were able to demonstrate that the transition from the excited singlet state to the excited triplet state occurs ultrafast in the time region of a 10-13 seconds. In purely organic materials without heavy atoms such as rare metals, such intersystem crossing usually occurs on time scales longer than 10-9 seconds. The empirical results of this study are expected to be applied as a method for stabilizing and developing light-unstable materials in the future.

Giants in History: Hideki Yukawa (23 January 1907 – 8 September 1981) was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1949 for predicting the existence of the pi meson subatomic particle

Researchers at the Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo studied the anomalous properties of amorphous solids, including glasses, using computer simulations, and found a common vibrational mechanism underlying them, which may help control the glass properties

Dr. Nishikawa at Osaka Metropolitan University focused on the Kondo effect on minimal ferrimagnetism and attempted to elucidate it theoretically. As a result, they found that the Kondo effect occurred via multiple "quantum entangled states" depending on temperature and other factors. They also found that the Kondo effect suppressed electrical conductivity through minimal ferrimagnetism, when usually it is amplified in many other cases.

Researchers from the Osaka Metropolitan University Graduate School of Engineering have successfully developed a new technique allowing them to observe gas molecules packing into metal-organic frameworks (MOF) using infrared spectroscopy. Their innovation was to measure polarized light absorption of guest molecules in a MOF film to deduce molecule alignment using this common piece of lab equipment. This method is the first to show guest alignment and does so in real-time, while using an accessible and easily adoptable experimental setup. A short video (4 min) recreating their spectrometer modifications can be found in the Reference section.

Researchers at Osaka Metropolitan University and Osaka University used numerical simulations to confirm observations of quantized vortices in superfluid helium using silicon nanoparticles, improving understanding of quantum fluids and superconductors.

Tile patterns in which the same shape is laid out without gaps are found in the compound eyes of insects. Hexagonal tile patterns are common while shrimp eyes have a square pattern. We investigated tile pattern formation using Drosophila and revealed that the compound eye tile pattern is controlled by a geometrical division mechanism, Voronoi tessellation, in addition to physical constraints determined by the combination of the regular distribution and growth of the individual eyes.

Bacteria hitchhike on red blood cells, New model simulates effects of exercise on muscles, Argon found in air of ancient atmosphere and Revealing emergent elastic fields of chiral crystals. Read all in the April Editor's Choice and this month's Asia Research News 2022 magazine pick - Asia's race to outsmart antimicrobial resistance.

Researchers at The University of Tokyo used a hybrid of Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics simulations to predict the self-assembly of charged Janus particles, which may lead to biomimetic nanostructures that can assemble like proteins

Milling rice to separate the grain from the husks, produces about 100 million tons of rice husk waste globally each year. Scientists searching for a scalable method to fabricate quantum dots have developed a way to recycle rice husks to create the first silicon quantum dot LED light. Their new method transforms agricultural waste into state-of-the-art light-emitting diodes in a low-cost, environmentally friendly way.

Giants in History: Purnima Sinha (12 October 1927 – 11 July 2015), the first Bengali woman to receive a doctorate in physics, analysed clay structures using x-ray equipment that she built from salvaged World War II-era parts.

Giants in History: Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (19 October 1910 – 21 August 1995) was an Indian astrophysicist who studied the structure and evolution of stars.

A team led by a Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo researcher has created a model to probe the role of emergent elastic fields in chiral molecular crystals

Scientists developed a procedure to reproduce the double peak feature of x-ray emission spectroscopy (XES) spectra in liquid water.

With the aid of mathematics, materials chemistry enables dimension travel, unveiling that all properties of materials are governed by their dimension.

A Detailed comparative study on the structures and electrical properties of related insulators and superconductors

In a recent study published in the journal ACS Catalysis researchers from Kanazawa University describe novel scanning electrochemical cell microscopy measurements to determine sites of photoelectrochemical activity in titanium dioxide nanotubes.

Through numerical simulations, a researcher details the discovery of a new isolated skyrmion with a half-integer topological quantum number in the ferromagnetic phase of the magnetic quantum fluid Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC). The new skyrmion is generated by applying a spin current to a magnetic domain wall and it has an eccentric (off-center) spin singularity inside it.

An international research group demonstrated that the Kondo effect can have a significant impact on transition metal oxide compound, which has unique and desirable properties to realize wide range of quantum phenomena. The findings have provided more evidence in a decade long debate.

Tohoku University researchers have observed a rare change in the structure of a mineral-like crystal that, if controlled, could lead to the development of new functional materials.

Giants in History: Mohammad Abdus Salam (29 January 1926 – 21 November 1996) was a theoretical physicist and the first Pakistani to receive a Nobel Prize in science.

Researchers at Kanazawa University report in Applied Physics Letters the design of an ultrafast amplitude detector for use in high-speed atomic force microscopy. The detector will enable the real-time recording of fast dynamical processes of biomolecules.

Abundant, safe, and environmentally friendly, tin sulfide is predicted to be used in next generation solar cell panels. Now, a research group has used impurity doping to fabricate n-type conductive tin sulfide thin films, paving the way for their use in solar cells.

Using data on electromagnetic (EM) waves and plasma particles measured simultaneously via multiple satellites, an international collaborative research group has discovered the existence of invisible “propagation path” of EM waves and elucidated the mechanism by which EM waves propagate to the ground.

If researchers can detect Q-balls in gravitational waves, it could help explain why more matter than anti-matter was left over after the Big Bang.

In 2019, a new superconductor was discovered amongst the nickelates (nickel-based oxides), but only now have the underlying physical and chemical similarities with their Periodic-Table twin superconductors, the cuprates, been identified.

Researchers at The University of Tokyo use numerical simulations to model the process called devitrification during which glasses crystallize, which may help improve the long-term stability of glassy materials, like pharmaceuticals and smartphone screens.

Giants in History: Chinese physicist Xie Xide (19 March 1921 – 4 March 2000) was an influential educator and one of China’s pioneer researchers of solid-state physics.

Researchers from The University of Tokyo Institute of Industrial Science use optical microscopy to form a picture of what’s really going on inside surfactant onions

Researchers from The University of Tokyo Institute of Industrial Science find that drones may be the next generation of communication bases to monitor the ocean and seafloor because of their high-speed positioning, stability, and efficiency.