3D Printed Building Powered by a 3D Printing Car

 

Posted: 17 Oct 2015 11:00 AM PDT

AMIE est un bâtiment conçu grâce à une impression 3D menée par une voiture, pour assurer flexibilité et mobilité durant la construction. La voiture possède un générateur qui n’a pas besoin d’être connecté à une source d’énergie, elle fonctionne grâce à un système magnétique sans fil (un peu comme un chargeur géant de téléphone portable). La firme Skidmore, Owings and Merrill a travaillé en collaboration avec le U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory pour imaginer cette incroyable maison, dans le cadre du projet Additive Manufacturing Integrated Energy.

5 Ways to Improve Your Skin Through Food

 

Getty Images   Yes, you are welcome to use food on your skin As anyone who’s broken out after a late-night drinking and pizza binge can attest, diet is clearly linked to skin condition. But there’s so much conflicting information about how to manage your diet for the most beautiful skin possible, as well all kinds of wacky DIY recipes (we’ll pass on the mayonnaise face mask, thank you very much). To get some clarity, FWx spoke to nutrition expert and esthetician Britta Plug, who helps clients overhaul their diets and skincare routines at Brooklyn’s Treatment by Lanshin. Here, she debunks beauty myths and calls out natural health trends to look for in 2015. 1. Eat Less Inflammatory Foods The biggest culprit are inflammatory foods like dairy, gluten and sugar. If you’re having issues with your skin, those are foods to experiment with eliminating. Try taking them out for two weeks and see if that has any effect. Also, when you bring those foods back in your body will have a more heightened reaction, so you can see how they affect you—gas, bloating, headaches, whatever the symptoms are for you. If you’re eating them all the time, your body has more of a low-grade reaction. We all have varying tolerance levels, but those foods are the general culprits. 2. Only Eat High Quality Dark Chocolate I used to think the advice about chocolate [making you break out] was a myth, but since I’ve started working with an acupuncturist, I’ve been incorporating a lot of Chinese medicine into my practice, and there is something behind the idea that chocolate can be inflammatory. But we’ve also been exploring the benefits of high quality dark chocolate for cystic acne. It depends on the person. 3. Invest in a Good Probiotic Gut health and skin health are really tightly linked. Probiotics are huge. High quality probiotics, in capsule form, are great, as are fermented foods like kimchi. People often say to me, “Well I eat a lot of yogurt.” But you have to be eating whole milk, low sugar yogurt to get the benefits, and you first want to make sure you’re not sensitive to dairy. That’s why I really recommend sauerkraut and kimchi. If you start taking a high quality probiotic, you’ll usually notice a pretty big difference—you will go to the bathroom more often! You want to start with just once a day, and then work up to the recommended dosage. All probiotics are labeled by what they contain, but it can be tricky to make sure you’re getting quality ones, even from a health food store. It’s best if you can pay a visit to a functional medicine practitioner. I don’t officially endorse them, but I use Dr. Mercola probiotics often in my practice. 4. Use Food on Your Face While eating yogurt can by iffy if you’re sensitive to dairy, it’s great for using as a mask. It’s a little acidic and it’s nourishing, plus strengthens the flora of the skin. I am a huge fan of using honey on the skin. It’s an amazing cure-all. Any honey is great, but Manuka honey in particular just works miracles for any skin type. It’s full of vitamins so it’s great for acne and anti-aging. I especially love it for after sun-care. To make a mask, mix about half a teaspoon of honey and mix it with half a teaspoon of warm water, and just spread it onto your skin and leave on for as long as you can before rinsing off. I’ve definitely fallen asleep with honey mask on and woken up stuck to my pillowcase. Manuka honeys are all labeled with a UMF rating, the Unique Manuka Factor. The higher the UMF, the better. I think 16+ is the highest I’ve seen. 5. Experiment with Charcoal and Sandalwood Charcoal has always been big for the skin, but I’ve been seeing a lot of charcoal drinks coming out, like charcoal lemonades. It can be helpful if you need a detox. For example, if you’re gluten intolerant and accidentally ingest gluten, you can take a charcoal capsule to rebalance your gut. Sandalwood is also something we’re going to be seeing a lot more of, in things like skincare oils. All essential oils are healing, and sandalwood is especially helpful for getting circulation going for healing. In Chinese medicine it’s referred to as a “blood mover,” so it can be great for congested or acne prone skin. One Important General Tip: Don’t Strip Your Skin I think one of the biggest mistakes I see people making is overwashing and scrubbing their skin. I recommend just cleansing once a day, at night, to remove any makeup and pollution from your skin. Then, just rinse with water in the morning. And keep your routine fairly simple. This article originally appeared on FWx.com. QUIZ: Should You Eat This or That? Getty Images (4)   http://time.com/3678726/use-food-improve-skin/

China Details Next-Gen Nuclear Reactor Program

 

China, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy, says it will deploy advanced nuclear reactors commercially by 2030. By Richard Martin on October 16, 2015 Why It Matters The development of molten-salt reactors could produce an essentially limitless source of safe, zero-carbon energy. Chinese and American scientists meet at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, scene of the historic molten-salt reactor experiment in the 1960s, to mark their collaboration on next-generation nuclear power. A group of nuclear scientists and entrepreneurs gathered this week at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, in Tennessee, to observe the 50th anniversary of the molten-salt reactor experiment—a program carried out at Oak Ridge in the 1960s to build a novel nuclear reactor. Molten-salt reactors use liquid, rather than solid fuel rods, as the fuel to produce the nuclear reactions that heat water to make steam and, in turn, electricity. They have several advantages over conventional light-water reactors in terms of safety, anti-proliferation, and economics, and are enjoying a renaissance as the world searches for sources of low-cost, low-carbon energy. The 50th anniversary workshop, which included presentations from reactor developers including TerraPower, Flibe Energy, Moltex Energy, and Terrestrial Energy, as well as the large utility Southern Power, marked the largest and most significant gathering to date of the people working to bring this innovative yet decades-old technology to commercialization. Among the presenters was Xu Hongjie, the director of the molten-salt reactor program at the Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics. Under the auspices of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, SINAP is collaborating with Oak Ridge to advance research on both salt-cooled reactors (which use molten salts to transfer heat and to cool the reactor) and salt-fueled reactors (in which the fuel, where the energy-producing nuclear reactions occur, is dissolved within the salt coolant). Signed in December 2011, the Shanghai-Oak Ridge effort has been the subject of controversy and speculation among the nuclear power community, particularly those promoting advanced technologies such as molten-salt reactors and the use of thorium, an alternative nuclear fuel that is cleaner, safer, and more abundant than uranium. At Oak Ridge this week, Xu outlined a roadmap that shows that China is further along than any other advanced reactor R&D program in the world. China, which still gets nearly three-quarters of its electricity from burning coal, is racing to develop low-carbon energy sources, including both conventional nuclear plants and advanced systems such as molten-salt reactors. The largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, China aims to more than double its nuclear capacity by 2020, according to the World Nuclear Association. Xu detailed a multi-stage plan to build demonstration reactors in the next five years and deploy them commercially beginning around 2030. The institute plans to build a 10-megawatt prototype reactor, using solid fuel, by 2020, along with a two-megawatt liquid-fuel machine that will demonstrate the thorium-uranium fuel cycle. (Thorium, which is not fissile, is converted inside a reactor into a fissile isotope of uranium that produces energy and sustains the nuclear reaction.) In all, there are 700 nuclear engineers working on the molten-salt reactor at SINAP, Xu said, a number that dwarfs other advanced-reactor research programs around the world. The team has a preliminary design for a 10-megawatt thorium-based molten-salt reactor, and has mastered some of the technical challenges involved in building and running such reactors, such as the preparation of high-purity molten salts and the control of tritium, a dangerous isotope of hydrogen that can be used in the making of nuclear weapons. Limiting the production of tritium is a key research goal for the development of molten-salt reactors. While most of the audience at Oak Ridge was familiar with the outlines of the Chinese program, the level of sophistication and the progress to date were startling to many listeners. “It’s very surprising how far they’ve come in four years,” said John Kutsch, the vice president for business development at Terrestrial Energy, which is developing its own version of a molten-salt reactor. “That shows you what throwing hundreds of researchers at a project will do to speed progress.” The Chinese program alarms some American researchers, who view China as a rival in the nuclear arena and are opposed to the sharing of technology that was originally developed in the United States. China is seeking not only to build reactors to supply domestic power but also to become a major supplier of nuclear technology to the world market. When the U.S.-China agreement was first announced, some commentators described the collaboration as a dangerous, even treacherous, form of technology transfer. Viewed from a broader perspective, the development of safe, economical nuclear power technology that can be commercialized and deployed rapidly would be a huge achievement in the struggle to limit global climate change, regardless of which country gets there first. Faced with a long path to funding and licensing their technology in the United States, many developers of next-generation nuclear reactors have said they will likely test their machines in other countries, including China. Under the collaboration agreement, says David Holcomb, the principal investigator from Oak Ridge on the program, “both institutions are seeking to more rapidly advance salt-cooled reactors. As such, the coӧperative work is jointly approved by both governments.” Like scientists everywhere, Xu is also faced with securing funding for the next phases of the program. SINAP’s molten-salt reactor research is funded through 2017, he says; beyond that the institute is seeking new funding from the central government, the Shanghai government, and the private sector. SINAP also recently signed an agreement with Fangda Group, a major Chinese conglomerate that produces carbon products, iron and steel, and chemicals, to help develop molten-salt coolants for the reactors. “I’m very confident” that SINAP will be able to carry its molten-salt reactor program to commercialization, Xu says. “Because, you see, in general the Chinese government intends to support the development of future technologies for nuclear energy. And the China market is very big for nuclear energy technologies.”   http://www.technologyreview.com/news/542526/china-details-next-gen-nuclear-reactor-program/

Why high-performance glass flows, and how fast

 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 7:36am Matthew Chin, Univ. of California, Los Angeles Atomic structure of a simulated sodium aluminosilicate glass, representative of Corning Gorilla Glass. Silicon, aluminum, sodium and oxygen atoms are represented in blue, cyan, red and yellow, respectively. Image: Mengyi Wang/UCLADoes glass in cathedral windows flow downward at room temperature—acting essentially as a liquid in super slow-motion? No. It’s a myth. The larger volume observed at the bottom of some windows is due to the manufacturing process, not gravity. But in more complex, high-tech kinds of glass, like Corning Gorilla Glass, a scratch- and damage-resistant glass used on more than one billion smartphones and tablets screens, susceptibility to room-temperature deformations have been known to exist for a few years. Now researchers from the Univ. of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have discovered why such flowing happens and how fast. Using molecular dynamics simulations of different glasses, the researchers showed that high-performance glass can exhibit some long-term deformations that are proportional to how large the piece of glass is. Glass on your mobile phone’s screen might not flow at all in its short lifetime, but large screens, such as those for giant TV screens can start to flow during the first few months after the glass is manufactured at a tiny but perceptible rate, about 10 micrometers per year for a one-meter-square piece of glass. While rate may seem slow, the effect is enough to limit how large these screens can be, the researchers said. The research, led by Mathieu Bauchy, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, was reported in Physical Review Letters. “We found that this long-term relaxation is due to the coexistence of competitive chemical elements of different sizes in the atomic network of the glass, which is known as the mixed-alkali effect,” Bauchy said. The key is the use of two alkali ions, sodium and potassium, in the high-performance glass formation process. Sodium and potassium ions are typically added into the composition of glasses as their presence lowers the temperature needed to form glass, thereby saving energy. However, this process and combination of ions with different atomic sizes makes glass susceptible to long-term deformations, the researchers found. “Although the origin of the mixed-alkali effect remains debated, there are strong evidences that the size mismatch between the alkali atoms and the surrounding atomic network acts as a driving force to stimulate relaxation,” Bauchy said. “In a sense, any alkali ion that is not satisfied with the size of its local pocket will want to jump to another one that better fits.” This phenomenon is also considered the source of the “thermometer effect.” In the 19th century, most thermometers were made of glass containing equal portions of sodium and potassium, and revealed to gradually become inaccurate because of the deformation of the glass. “The next step will be to prescribe optimal glass compositions that feature little, if any, relaxation, in order to enable the design of large yet stable screens,” he said. Source: Univ. of California, Los Angeles http://www.rdmag.com/news/2015/10/why-high-performance-glass-flows-and-how-fast

Coolimages

 

Flamingo dormindo

Unique thermal properties discovered in 2-D black phosphorus nanoribbons

 

Berkeley Lab researchers have experimentally confirmed strong in-plane anisotropy in thermal conductivity along the zigzag (ZZ) and armchair (AC) directions of single-crystal black phosphorous nanoribbons. Credit: Junqiao Wu, Berkeley Lab A new experimental revelation about black phosphorus nanoribbons should facilitate the future application of this highly promising material to electronic, optoelectronic and thermoelectric devices. A team of researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has experimentally confirmed strong in-plane anisotropy in thermal conductivity, up to a factor of two, along the zigzag and armchair directions of single-crystal black phosphorus nanoribbons. "Imagine the lattice of black phosphorus as a two-dimensional network of balls connected with springs, in which the network is softer along one direction of the plane than another," says Junqiao Wu, a physicist who holds joint appointments with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division and the University of California (UC) Berkeley's Department of Materials Science and Engineering. "Our study shows that in a similar manner heat flow in the black phosphorus nanoribbons can be very different along different directions in the plane. This thermal conductivity anisotropy has been predicted recently for 2D black phosphorus crystals by theorists but never before observed." Wu is the corresponding author of a paper describing this research in Nature Communications titled "Anisotropic in-plane thermal conductivity of black phosphorus nanoribbons at temperatures higher than 100K." The lead authors are Sangwook Lee and Fan Yang.  Black phosphorus, named for its distinctive color, is a natural semiconductor with an energy bandgap that allows its electrical conductance to be switched "on and off." It has been theorized that in contrast to graphene, black phosphorus has opposite anisotropy in thermal and electrical conductivities -- i.e., heat flows more easily along a direction in which electricity flows with more difficultly. Such anisotropy would be a boost for designing energy-efficient transistors and thermoelectric devices, but experimental confirmation proved challenging because of sample preparation and measurement requirements. "We fabricated black phosphorus nanoribbons in a top-down approach using lithography, then utilized suspended micro-pad devices to thermally isolate the nanoribbons from the environment so that tiny temperature gradient and thermal conduction along a single nanoribbon could be accurately determined," Wu says. "We also went the extra mile to engineer the interface between the nanoribbon and the contact electrodes to ensure negligible thermal and electrical contact resistances, which is essential for this type of experiment." The results of the study, which was carried out at the Molecular Foundry, a DOE Office Science User Facility hosted by Berkeley Lab, revealed high directional anisotropy in thermal conductivity at temperatures greater than 100 Kelvin. This anisotropy was attributed mainly to phonon dispersion with some contribution from phonon-phonon scattering rate, both of which are orientation-dependent. Detailed analysis revealed that at 300 Kelvin, thermal conductivity decreased as the thickness of the nanoribbon thickness shrank from approximately 300 nanometers to approximately 50 nanometers. The anisotropy ratio remained at a factor of two within this thickness range. "The anisotropy we discovered in the thermal conductivity of black phosphorus nanoribbons indicates that when these layered materials are patterned into different shapes for microelectronic and optoelectronic devices, the lattice orientation of the patterns should be considered," Wu says. "This anisotropy can be especially advantageous if heat generation and dissipation play a role in the device operation. For example, these orientation-dependent thermal conductivities give us opportunities to design microelectronic devices with different lattice orientations for cooling and operating microchips. We could use efficient thermal management to reduce chip temperature and enhance chip performance." Wu and his colleagues plan to use their experimental platform to investigate how thermal conductivity in black phosphorus nanoribbons is affected under different scenarios, such as hetero-interfaces, phase-transitions and domain boundaries. They also want to explore the effects of various physical conditions such as stress and pressure. Story Source: The above post is reprinted from materials provided by DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. Journal Reference: Sangwook Lee, Fan Yang, Joonki Suh, Sijie Yang, Yeonbae Lee, Guo Li, Hwan Sung Choe, Aslihan Suslu, Yabin Chen, Changhyun Ko, Joonsuk Park, Kai Liu, Jingbo Li, Kedar Hippalgaonkar, Jeffrey J. Urban, Sefaattin Tongay, Junqiao Wu. Anisotropic in-plane thermal conductivity of black phosphorus nanoribbons at temperatures higher than 100 K. Nature Communications, 2015; 6: 8573 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms9573   http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151016135329.htm