Consumer oriented 3D printers could show up on many Christmas wish lists this year, but purchasers should be aware of recent research conducted at Georgia Institute of Technology that highlights how the popular low cost devices could pose a health risk by harming indoor air quality.

From liquid laundry detergent packaged in cardboard to compostable plastic cups, consumer products these days are increasingly touting their sustainable and renewable origins. Now researchers at Georgia Institute of Technology have created a material derived from crab shells and tree fibres that has the potential to replace the flexible plastic packaging used to keep food fresh.

A delivery system for bacteriophages—viruses that selectively attack harmful bacteria—could help give doctors a new way to battle lung infections that threaten older patients and people with cystic fibrosis. Phage therapy is a promising alternative to antibiotics because it attacks specific pathogens, does not harm the body’s normal contingent of bacteria and won’t contribute to multi-drug resistance.

By treating living cells like tiny absorbent sponges, researchers have developed a potentially new way to introduce molecules and therapeutic genes into human cells. The technique first compresses cells in a microfluidic device by rapidly flowing them through a series of tiny “speed bumps” built into the micro-channels, which compresses out small amounts of fluid – known as cytosol – from inside the cells.

A remote command could one day send immune cells on a rampage against a malignant tumour. The ability to mobilise, from outside the body, targeted cancer immunotherapy inside the body has taken a step closer to becoming reality. Bioengineers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have installed a heat-sensitive switch into T-cells that can activate the T-cells when heat turns the switch on.

When tasked with redesigning a medical device, four biomedical engineering majors focused their attention on scalpels. Specifically, the blade packaging for the tool. Their blade packaging was designed to protect health care workers from accidental injuries that can occur when handling exposed scalpel blades. Now their invention, Scal-Pal, is one of six competing for Georgia Tech’s InVenture Prize, an annual innovation competition...

  Some novel materials that sound too good to be true turn out to be true and good. An emergent class of semiconductors, which could affordably light up our future with nuanced colors emanating from lasers, lamps, and even window glass, could be the latest example. These materials are very radiant, easy to process from solution, and energy-efficient.

Powering clean, efficient cars is just one way fuel cell technology could accelerate humanity into a sustainable energy future, but unfortunately, the technology has been a bit sluggish. Now, engineers may be able to essentially turbocharge fuel cells with a new catalyst. The sluggishness comes from a chemical bottleneck, the rate of processing oxygen, a key ingredient that helps fuel cells, which are related to batteries, produce electricit...

Machine learning has been around for decades, but the advent of big data and more powerful computers has increased its impact significantly — ­moving machine learning beyond pattern recognition and natural language processing into a broad array of scientific disciplines. A subcategory of artificial intelligence, machine learning deals with the construction of algorithms that enable computers to learn from and react to data rather t...

When tasked with redesigning a medical device, four biomedical engineering majors focused their attention on scalpels. Specifically, the blade packaging for the tool. Their blade packaging was designed to protect health care workers from accidental injuries that can occur when handling exposed scalpel blades. Now their invention, Scal-Pal, is one of six competing for Georgia Tech’s InVenture Prize, an annual innovation competition...

The research team that announced the first optical rectenna in 2015 is now reporting a two-fold efficiency improvement in the devices — and a switch to air-stable diode materials. The improvements could allow the rectennas – which convert electromagnetic fields at optical frequencies directly to electrical current – to operate low-power devices such as temperature sensors.

Big data and data mining have provided several breakthroughs in fields such as health informatics, smart cities and marketing. The same techniques, however, have not delivered consistent key findings for climate change. There are a few reasons why. The main one is that previous data mining work in climate science, and in particular in the analysis of climate teleconnections, has relied on methods that offer rather simplistic 'yes or no' answ...

A nanostructured gate dielectric may have addressed the most significant obstacle to expanding the use of organic semiconductors for thin-film transistors. The structure, composed of a fluoropolymer layer followed by a nanolaminate made from two metal oxide materials, serves as gate dielectric and simultaneously protects the organic semiconductor – which had previously been vulnerable to damage from the ambient environment – and enabl...

Cracking the German Enigma code is considered to be one of the decisive factors that hastened Allied victory in World War II. Now researchers have used similar techniques to crack some of the brain’s mysterious code. By statistically analysing clues intercepted through espionage, computer science pioneers in the 1940s were able to work out the rules of the Enigma code, turning a string of gibberish characters into plain language to exp...

Luke Skywalker’s bionic hand is a step closer to reality for amputees in this galaxy. Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have created an ultrasonic sensor that allows amputees to control each of their prosthetic fingers individually. It provides fine motor hand gestures that aren’t possible with current commercially available devices. The first amputee to use it, a musician who lost part of his right arm five year...

Technology that could be used in self-powered smart cities of the future will soon be demonstrated at the NASA Kennedy Space Center’s Visitor Complex at Cape Canaveral, Florida. Ilan Stern, a senior research scientist with the Georgia Tech Research Institute, and colleagues, are collaborating on a $2 million project supported by NASA contractor Delaware North Corporation to build a 40,000-square-foot lighted outdoor footpath demonstrating a...

The secrets of 17th century artists can now be revealed, thanks to 21st century signal processing. Using modern high-speed scanners and the advanced signal processing techniques, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology are peering through layers of pigment to see how painters prepared their canvasses, applied undercoats, and built up layer upon layer of paint to produce their masterpieces.

A discovery by researchers from Princeton University, the Georgia Institute of Technology and Humboldt University in Berlin points the way to more widespread use of an advanced technology generally known as organic electronics. The research, published in the journal Nature Materials, focused on organic semiconductors, a class of materials prized for their applications in emerging technologies such as flexible electronics, solar energy c...

A transfer technique based on thin sacrificial layers of boron nitride could allow high-performance gallium nitride gas sensors to be grown on sapphire substrates and then transferred to metallic or flexible polymer support materials. The technique could facilitate the production of low-cost wearable, mobile and disposable sensing devices for a wide range of environmental applications.

By combining engineered polymeric materials known as hydrogels with complex intestinal tissue known as organoids – made from human pluripotent stem cells – researchers have taken an important step toward creating a new technology for controlling the growth of these organoids and using them for treating wounds in the gut that can be caused by disorders such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).