A team of acoustic researchers has built macroscopic crystal structures that use internal rotation to attenuate the propagation of waves. The method makes it possible to build very light and stiff materials that can also 'swallow' low frequencies very well, as they report.
Read moreScientists have created a nano-electronic circuit which vibrates without any external force. Just as a guitar string vibrates when plucked, the wire — 100,000 times thinner than a guitar string — vibrates when forced into motion by an oscillating voltage. The surprise came when they repeated the experiment without the forcing voltage. Under the right conditions, the wire oscillated of its own accord. The nano-guitar string was playing itself.
Read moreA team of scientists characterized the predominant human noise sources in 66 national parks in the US, in an effort to help parks better manage the noise problem.
Read moreResearchers have invented an algorithm that produces a real-time portamento effect, gliding a note at one pitch into a note of another pitch, between any two audio signals, such as a piano note gliding into a human voice.
Read moreResearchers have fabricated a novel glass and synthetic diamond foundation that can be used to create miniscule micro — and nanostructures. This new substrate is low cost and leaves minimal waste, the researchers say.
Read moreResearchers experimentally determined a property of cadmium called the magic wavelength which is considered essential for the development of the most accurate clocks ever envisaged. The researchers hope this may permit simple and robust atomic clocks so accurate they could be used to improve our understanding of current theories and even test for new physics.
Read moreAcoustics is a missing dimension in silicon chips because acoustics can complete specific tasks that are difficult to do with electronics and optics alone. For the first time researchers have added this dimension to the standard silicon photonics platform. The concept combines the communication and bandwidth offered by light with the selective processing of sound waves.
Read moreResearchers will report a new laser-based sensor that effectively detects buried objects even while the detector is in motion. This new device offers a significant improvement over existing technologies, which cannot be operated on the go and lose accuracy in the presence of external sources of sound or vibration.
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