News on China's scientific and technological development.

A Zhejiang scientist displays the world's lightest material, which has a density of only 0.16 mg/cubic centimeter, one-sixth that of air. (Photo Source: China Daily / Long Wei)



By Wang Hongyi in Shanghai

BEIJING, March 22 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese scientists say they have developed the world's lightest material, which they expect to play an important role in tackling pollution.

With a density of just 0.16 milligrams per cubic centimeter, a sixth that of air, graphene aerogel - which is also known as carbon aerogel - has been developed by Professor Gao Chao from Zhejiang University in Hangzhou.

He said the most significant qualities of the new material are its ease of manufacture, and its strong oil-absorption.

The material is derived from a gel, with the liquid component replaced by a gas. It appears in solid state with extremely low density.

"Carbon aerogel is expected to play an important role in pollution control such as oil spill control, water purification and even air purification," said Gao, whose research paper on the material was first published online in the academic publication Advanced Materials on Feb 18, and in the research highlights column of Nature magazine.

In addition to being used in pollution control, carbon aerogel is expected to become an ideal material for energy storage insulation, as a catalytic carrier, and in sound absorption.

For years, scientists around the world have been looking for ways to produce the lightest known material.

In 2011, HRL Laboratory, the University of California Irvine, and California Institute of Technology cooperated in developing nickel aerogel with a density of 0.9 mg/cubic centimeter, the record lightest material at that time.

The aerogel developed by Gao and his research team was produced using freeze-dried solutions, which removed the moisture from carbon nanotubes and graphemes but which retained their integrity, creating what is now believed to be the world's lightest material.

"Carbon aerogel is similar to a carbon sponge in structure. When an aerogel the size of a mug is put on slender setaria grass, its blades do not bend," Gao said.

Despite its fragile appearance, carbon aerogel also has excellent elasticity and bounces back when compressed.

It is also one of the most oil-absorbent materials.

Current oil-absorbent products usually absorb organic solvent about 10 times their own weight - the newly developed carbon aerogel can absorb up to 900 times its own weight. Aerogel can also absorb organics quickly: 1 gram of aerogel can absorb 68.8 grams of organics per second, making it ideal for treating oil spills at sea.

The freeze-drying approach makes the aerogel production process more convenient for mass production and application, said Gao, adding the research team is conducting further research on its absorption performance, as well as other applications

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BEIJING - Scientists from China and the United States have mapped a key genetic code for bread wheat, a discovery that will help improve the crop's productivity and ability to withstand extreme conditions.

The sequencing and drafting of the A genome, one of the three basic genomes of wheat, was published on the website of the journal Nature on Monday. Researchers present the generation, assembly and analysis of a whole-genome shotgun draft sequence of the genome of wheat T. urartu, the donor of the A genome.

The identification of around 38,000 wheat genes is expected to help provide a valuable resource for accelerating deeper genomic breeding studies and offer a new foundation for the study of wheat evolution, domestication and genetic improvement.

The research, launched by a team from the Institute of Genetics and Development Biology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), was conducted by Shenzhen-based BGI, a leading genomics organization, and the University of California, Davis.

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum) is one of the most widely cultivated and consumed food crops in the world. It feeds about 40 percent of the world's population and provides 20 percent of a human's daily recommended amounts of calories and protein. Major efforts are underway around the world to increase the crop's yield and quality by boosting genetic diversity and resistance to cold, drought and disease.

However, the extremely large size and polyploid complexity of the wheat genome have so far posed substantial barriers for researchers to gain insight into its biology and evolution.

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Co-operation never mentioned by western media

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BEIJING - A group of international scientists working with the Beijing Spectrometer III (BES III) on Tuesday announced that they may have detected a new subatomic particle.

The new finding, referred to by the scientists as Zc(3900) for the time being, is likely to be a new exotic hadron, or a subatomic particle that does not fit into simple subatomic models, according to scientists working with the BES III, the main detector for the upgraded Beijing Electron-Positron Collider (BEPC II).

"One of the goals for the BES III experiments is to search for new exotic hadrons that don't fit into the traditional model for quarks," said Shen Xiaoyan, spokesperson for the scientists.

Almost 300 scientists from 11 nations have been taking part in the BES III experiments.

In 1988, the Beijing Electron-Positron Collider, China's first high-energy accelerator, completed its first successful collision. Its performance has improved since a 2008 upgrade.

The BES III scientists will continue to look for and study Zc(3900) and other new particles, according to Wang Yifang, director of the High-Energy Physics Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

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BEIJING - China is planning to build two new research stations in Antarctica by 2015 and site inspections are already being conducted by an expedition team, the State Oceanic Administration (SOA) said Thursday.

A summer station that can be used from December to March will be set up between the existing Zhongshan and Kunlun Stations to provide replenishment and other logistical support, the SOA said.

The station will be used to study geology, glaciers, geomagnetism and atmospheric science in Antarctica.

A perennial station will also be built in Victoria Land in Antarctica by 2015. The station will allow researchers to carry out multi-disciplinary research on bio-ecology and satellite remote sensing, according to the SOA.

China's three existing Antarctic research stations are the Great Wall, Zhongshan and Kunlun stations.

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Chinese scientists have made a significant contribution in the search for dark matter led by an international Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) team.

An Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer is a particle physics experiment module that is mounted on the International Space Station. It is designed to search for various types of unusual matter.

The core component of the AMS is a Chinese-made huge permanent magnet, said Chen Hesheng, primary member of the AMS team and also former director of the Institute of High Energy Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

The magnet, jointly made by CAS Institute of Electrical Engineering, CAS Institute of High Energy Physics and China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, is used to identify particles carrying positive electricity from those carrying negative electricity.

"Matter known by human beings now only account for four percent of the components of the universe, while dark matter is almost six times of already-known matter," Chen said, "However, there is no proof to testify the existence of dark matter."

Chen said positrons can be produced when two particles of dark matter collide and that they will be detected by the AMS.

"Results announced on Wednesday showed that more than 400,000 positrons have been observed by the AMS. The positrons may originate from long-searched dark matter or from pulsars distributed around the galactic plane," Chen said. "Anyhow, we move a step forward towards the reliable evidence of dark matter."

According to Chen, putting an enormous magnet into space was the biggest challenge for the AMS project.

"Chinese scientists chose a new type of high magnetic energy product,Neodymium Iron Boron, and adopted a unique design of magnetic circuit to prolong the service life of the magnet upto 18 to 20 years," Chen said.

The magnet passed a strict examination by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration to become the first colossal magnet sent into space, Chen added.

Meanwhile, the electromagnetic calorimeter of the prober was co-designed by Chinese, Italian and French scientists, which accurately measured the amount of energy carried by electrons and positrons.

Data analysis created by Chinese scientists also played an important role in the AMS experiment, including charge measurement, particle identification and energy measurement, Chen said.

"More data is needed to confirm the existence of dark matter," Chen said. "Chinese researchers will keep working with the AMS team to continue the research which is of great significance to physics."

Dark matter is one of the most important mysteries of physics. Accounting for over a quarter of the universe's mass-energy balance, it can be observed indirectly through its interaction with visible matter but has not yet been directly detected.

On Wednesday, Nobel Laureate Samuel Ting, head of the AMS team, announced the first results in the search for dark matter and reported an excess of positrons in the cosmic ray flux.

On May 16, 2011, the shuttle Endeavor launched the AMS-2 on the International Space Station, in search for dark matter particles in space.

According to Ting, the AMS-2 started to send data back to earth on May 19. The first results of AMS were based on data collected from May 2011 to Dec. 2012.

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escobar said:

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How can china participate in a NASA program?

kroko said:

How can china participate in a NASA program?

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Technically it's managed at nasa's johnson space centre but I think it's an international effort.


And in this particular case I suppose china's expertise or humongous-magnet-making-expertise was required so nasa had to oblige. From what I've read, it sounds like nasa actually would like to cooperate with china more on space, while it's the us government freaking out.

Heat Resistant PLA Foam Sheet Made by NIMTE
2013-04-09


Polylactic acid (PLA) is a bio-based polymer made by using starch as the raw material. The advantages of PLA include high strength, high modulus and biodegradability, but its drawbacks of low heat resistance, brittleness, and high cost limit its applications. Making heat resistant PLA foam sheet is one of major goals for PLA researchers because the foam has good toughness and low cost.

The foam sheet can be easily thermoformed into short life packaging stuff such as food containers. The short life stuff is the ideal application for PLA since this stuff is very

Fig.1 Food Containers
hard to be recycled or reused. But the low melt strength of PLA renders it difficult to make foam, especially foam sheet. Although there were some reports on making PLA foam sheet, it was not broadly used due to its low heat resistance. The L, D-PLA stereocomplex can be made foam sheet, but its price is too high to be widely used. The most economical approach is to make heat resistant foam sheet directly from regular PLLA.

Prof. ZHU Jin’s group of the Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, the Chinese Academy of Sciences(NIMTE), and the Guangzhou Bio-plus Materials Technology Co., Ltd. () have solved both the issues of low melt strength and low heat resistance of PLA. The heat distortion temperature of PLA has been improved to 120℃ from 55℃ of regular PLLA. The heat resistant PLA foam sheet was successfully obtained through a commercial foaming extruder by using butane or CO2 as the foaming agent. The foam sheet has been thermoformed into a variety of food containers such as plates, cups, boxes, and so on (Fig.1). The foaming ratio is more than 15 times.

The thermoformed containers can stand the temperature more than 100℃. It can replace the stuff made by polystyrene foam and paper. Several companies are now working on making the commercial products. The real heat resistant PLA foam products will come soon.

The group and their partner are seeking worldwide cooperation with plastic processing companies to manufacture various products based on this PLA foam sheet.

Contact:
Professor ZHU Jin: [email protected]
Research Gruop Url :
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Video: 2012 China Military Technological Achievements

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What the hell is the PRC Ministry of Health doing (or not doing)...

First it was

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, then

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, then

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, then

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, then

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, and now more pigs and also a brand new entrant to the Chinese animal apocalypse: dogs.

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that hundreds more pigs have been found dead in China - this time together with dozens of dogs. "A total of 410 pigs and 122 dogs were discovered in homes and at farms earlier this week in a village that comes under Yanshi city's jurisdiction in central Henan province, authorities said Wednesday. The city's propaganda office said that the deaths were being investigated but that they suspected they had to do with nearby chemical factories. The factories have been ordered to suspend production and help police with a criminal investigation into the incident, according to a report on a Henan provincial news website."

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