American Chemical Society

Toward Safer Disposal of Printed Circuit Boards

Printed circuit boards are vital components of modern electronics. However, once they have served their purpose, they are often burned or buried in landfills, polluting the air, soil and water.

Blueprint for Nanomaterial Offers Hope to Newborns, Elderly, Doctors

Newborn babies, elderly people, sick hospital patients and sports enthusiasts all stand to gain from a breakthrough in the development of wearable technology using nanomaterials.

A Self-Healing Sweat Sensor

Wearable sensors that track heart rate or steps are popular fitness products. But in the future, working up a good sweat could provide useful information about a person's health. Now, researchers reporting have developed a headband that measures electrolyte levels in sweat. And unlike many previous sweat sensors, the device can heal itself when cut or scratched during exercise.

How Light a Foldable and Long-Lasting Battery can be

With the launch of wearable devices and smartphones that require high capacity of electricity such as foldable phones and 5G phones, the interest in batteries are increasing and various battery types are developed. For example, flexible batteries embedded in the mobile watch band or wireless power sharing batteries that have developed from wireless charging.

2D Dielectric Inks Suitable for Print-in-Place Electronics

A team have produced a two-dimensional hexagonal boron nitride ink which has been used to fabricate flexible thin-film transistors.

Scratching the Surface of Perovskites

Versatile compounds called perovskites are valued for their application in next generation solar energy technologies. Despite their efficiency and relative cheapness, perovskite devices have yet to be perfected; they often contain atomic-level structural defects.

Making Tiny Antennas for Wearable Electronics

When it comes to electronics, bigger usually isn't better. This is especially true for a new generation of wearable communication systems that promise to connect people, machines and other objects in a wireless "internet of things." To make the devices small and comfortable enough to wear, scientists need to miniaturize their components.

Stretchable, Degradable Semiconductors

To seamlessly integrate electronics with the natural world, materials are needed that are both stretchable and degradable -- for example, flexible medical devices that conform to the surfaces of internal organs, but that dissolve and disappear when no longer needed.

A Stretchable Stopwatch Lights Up Human Skin

Imagine a runner who doesn't need to carry a stopwatch or cell phone to check her time: She could just gaze at the glowing stopwatch display on the back of her hand. Such human-machine interfaces are no longer science fiction, but they still have a way to go before becoming mainstream. Now, researchers have developed a stretchable light-emitting device that operates at low voltages and is safe for human skin.

Pacifier Biosensor Could Help Monitor Newborn Health

Wearable biosensors that non-invasively monitor health and fitness are growing in popularity among adults. However, adapting this technology for use with babies is difficult, now researchers say they have developed a pacifier-based biosensor that tracks real-time glucose levels in saliva.

Efficient Electrochemical Energy Storage

The rapid development of electronic devices and power equipment, such as new-energy vehicles and robots, has sparked extensive demand for portable power sources. Electrochemical energy storage, mainly based on ionic intercalation/motion or adsorption/diffusion in electrodes, has been utilized in the last two centuries.

Spotlight on ACS Material

"You need a reliable source for highly advanced materials", ACS Materials will be exhibiting at The IDTechEx Show! November 20-21 2019, Santa Clara, CA.

Next-gen solar cells mimic photosynthesis with biological material

Next-generation solar cells that mimic photosynthesis with biological material may give new meaning to the term "green technology."

Graphene and carbon nanotubes combine into transparent hybrid material

Scientists have combined graphene and single-walled carbon nanotubes into a transparent hybrid material with conductivity higher than either component exhibits separately.

Bacteria trapped — and terminated — by graphene filter

Airborne bacteria may see what looks like a comfy shag carpet on which to settle. But it's a trap. Scientists have transformed their laser-induced graphene into self-sterilizing filters that grab pathogens out of the air and kill them with small pulses of electricity.

Printed electronics open way for electrified tattoos

The first demonstration of a fully print-in-place electronics technique is gentle enough to work on surfaces as delicate as human skin and paper.

Using machine learning to estimate risk of cardiovascular death

Humans are inherently risk-averse: We spend our days calculating routes and routines, taking precautionary measures to avoid disease, danger, and despair. Still, our measures for controlling the inner workings of our biology can be a little more unruly. With that in mind, a team from MIT's Computer Science and Artifi

A chameleon-inspired smart skin changes color in the sun

Researchers have taken a page from the chameleon's playbook to develop a flexible smart skin that changes its color in response to heat and sunlight.

Fuel cells developed using nanomaterials are cost effective, efficient

A fuel cell can be built from cheaper, more widely available metals using an atomic-level design that also gives the material long-term stability.

The Swiss Army Knife of gene editing gets new control

When researchers want to edit, activate, or silence a gene in any living organism, from bacteria to humans, they often turn to CRISPR/Cas9, a complex of RNA and protein that can act like a genetic Swiss Army Knife.