WHAT A WEEKEND

If you’re reading this, you’re part of the tiny tribe of people who voluntarily spend their free time thinking about how materials break, how devices move charge, and how we squeeze more performance out of silicon, steel, and anything that conducts, bends, or burns.

(1) You drill a hole through the center of a spinning disc. Does it spin: Faster OR Slower?

(2) You increase the thickness of a metal wire carrying the same current. Does it get: Hotter OR Cooler?

(3) You increase the voltage to an electric motor. Does it draw: More current OR Less current?

Uh-oh none of you got all three right this time.

This week’s mystery gift? I’m telling you… unreasonably good.
Want it? Answer these 👇

Let’s see how dangerous your engineering instincts really are!

Predict the outcome:

Q1: You cool a metal below its critical temperature. Its magnetic field lines:
A) Pass through
B) Get expelled

Q2: You increase strain in a semiconductor quantum well. Hole mobility:
A) Decreases
B) Increases
C) Stays the same

Q3: You split a multilayer material into isolated 2D planes. Electron correlation effects:
A) Strengthen
B) Weaken
C) Disappear

Know the answers?
Reply with your picks here.

WANT TO REACH AN AUDIENCE OF OVER 63K ENGINEERS?
CLICK HERE TO SEE HOW WE CAN PARTNER TO HELP!

Do you know why your phone gets hot when you're running too many apps?

It’s because silicon chips are hitting their limits. As transistors shrink, electrons bump into more stuff and generate heat.

Warwick University found a fix: grow a super-thin layer of germanium on top of silicon.

Germanium atoms naturally sit farther apart than silicon atoms: so when you force them onto a silicon base, they get squeezed together.

That squeeze makes the crystal structure cleaner. Fewer bumps. Electrons flow through MUCH faster.

And because it's built on regular silicon wafers, factories don't need to change anything.

Read more here

Solar cells have a dumb problem: the metal wires that collect electricity sit on top and block sunlight from getting in.

You're literally shading the thing that needs light.

LONGi (a Green Energy R&D tech org) moved ALL the contacts to the back.

The entire front surface is now open. But they also fixed another issue, when light excites an electron, that electron sometimes falls back down and releases heat instead of flowing out as electricity. LONGi coated the surfaces with layers that plug those escape routes.

Result: 27.81% efficiency. Highest ever for silicon.

Read more here

McGill researchers basically scaled that up.

The problem with biodegradable batteries is that eco-friendly metals like magnesium form a crusty layer that blocks the chemical reaction. The battery dies fast.

Citric acid (the stuff in lemons) dissolves that crust and keeps the reaction going. 

Mix it into gelatin so it's soft. Cut it in a stretchy pattern.

Now you've got a battery that flexes 80%, outputs 1.3 volts, and actually biodegrades when you throw it away.

Wearables that don't sit in landfills forever?

Yes please.

Read more here

Quick crash course: Superconductors are materials that conduct electricity with ZERO resistance.

That means that no energy is lost to heat, there’s no wasted power and the flow is basically perfect.

The catch?

They only work at temperatures colder than outer space.

We've been trying to fix this for decades because room-temperature superconductivity would change everything: lossless power grids, better MRI machines, quantum computers that don't need some super fancy cooling.

A team from Japan, Taiwan, and the US just figured out something that's been confusing researchers for years. And it has to do with sandwiches.

THE WEIRD THING ABOUT COPPER OXIDE LAYERS

Copper oxide superconductors (called cuprates) stack layers of copper and oxygen atoms on top of each other.

Scientists noticed something strange a while back: the temperature at which these materials start superconducting depends on how many layers you stack together.

Three layers gives you the highest temperature. Not two. Not four. Not six. Exactly three.

Nobody could explain why 😦

SHOOTING ELECTRONS WITH A PARTICLE ACCELERATOR

The team used a synchrotron (basically a particle accelerator that produces intense photon beams) to blast electrons in triple-layer cuprates and watch how they behaved.

This technique, called angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, lets you map the electronic structure of a material: how much energy electrons have, how they move, what states they occupy.

What they found in the middle layer was weird.

It had barely any charge carriers (the particles that let electricity flow).

Normally that means terrible superconductivity.

But instead, this inner layer showed superconducting electrons at temperatures WAY above the normal transition point.

They're calling this a "nodal metal": a state where superconducting behavior exists at temperatures it shouldn't.

THE SANDWICH EFFECT

BUT

That middle copper oxide layer is squeezed between two outer layers that are already tuned for superconductivity.

It's getting influenced from both sides through something called the proximity effect, like being pressed between two space heaters.

With two layers, you don't get this sandwich. With four or more, the inner layers are too far from the outer ones to feel the effect.

Three layers is the sweet spot where the middle layer gets maximum superconducting influence from both neighbors.

THAT'S why triple-layer cuprates have the highest transition temperatures.

Nobody had directly observed this mechanism before.

WHY THIS ACTUALLY MATTERS

The team measured energy gaps around 80-100 meV in that inner layer, significantly larger than conventional superconductors.

Understanding how superconducting electrons form at higher temperatures gives us an actual blueprint for designing better materials.

We're not at room-temperature superconductors yet.

But we finally understand WHY certain structures work better than others, and that's how you go from "mysterious phenomenon" to "let's engineer this" 👀

Aerospace Propulsion Engineer, Long Beach, CA (Rocket Lab)
Making rocket engines that launch, land, and do it all over again.
Apply Now

Founding Robotics Hardware Engineer, Cambridge MA (Boost Robotics)
Building robot babysitters for data centers so the internet stays online.
Apply Now

Sr Principal Engineer, San Diego Metropolitan Area (West Yost)
Pipe whisperer making sure water actually arrives when you turn the tap.
Apply Now

WANT TO REACH AN AUDIENCE OF OVER 63K ENGINEERS?
CLICK HERE TO SEE HOW WE CAN PARTNER TO HELP!