An interdisciplinary team of researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham have developed a new plasma-enabled process that could limit the proliferation of toxins from implants into a patient's bloodstream. The team, led by Vinoy Thomas, Ph.D., associate professor in the UAB School of...

Our bodies have evolved formidable barriers to protect themselves against foreign substances—from our skin, to our cells and every component within the cells, each part of our bodies has protective layers. These defenses, while essential, pose a significant challenge for pharmaceutical drugs and...

Using nanoparticles to deliver cancer drugs offers a way to hit tumors with large doses of drugs while avoiding the harmful side effects that often come with chemotherapy. However, so far, only a handful of nanoparticle-based cancer drugs have been FDA-approved....

The past few decades have witnessed a great amount of research in the field of two-dimensional (2D) materials. As the name implies, these thin film-like materials are composed of layers that are only a few atoms thick. Many of the chemical and physical properties of 2D materials can be fine-tuned,...

A research team led by the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has succeeded for the first time in producing a molecular electric motor using the DNA origami method. The tiny machine made of genetic material self-assembles and converts electrical energy into kinetic energy. The new nanomotors can...

Cancers in humans have all sorts of ways to survive and thrive: Cells and tumors alike engage in devious means to deflect, deceive, and evade detection by our bodies' immune systems....

Going to the doctor might make you want to cry, and according to a new study, doctors could someday put those tears to good use. In ACS Nano, researchers report a nanomembrane system that harvests and purifies tiny blobs called exosomes from tears, allowing researchers to quickly analyze them for...

A space elevator, a structure connecting the Earth's surface to a space station, would allow for the cost-efficient transport of people and materials. However, a very light yet strong material is essential to making such a technology a reality. The carbon nanotube is a new kind of material that is...

New research led by University of Massachusetts Amherst assistant professor Jinglei Ping has overcome a major challenge to isolating and detecting molecules at the same time and at the same location in a microdevice. The work, recently published in ACS Nano, demonstrates an important advance in...

Precisely applied mechanical pressure can improve the electronic properties of a widely used polymer material. This requires that the material be mechanically processed to an accuracy of a few nanometers, a team from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) writes in the scientific journal...