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Bringing together chemists and physicists to thoroughly investigate how electrochemical processes work on the smallest scale. That is the goal of the new Advanced Nano-electrochemistry Institute of the Netherlands, or ANION for short. The consortium receives a Gravitation funding of 23.6 million euros for this purpose.

Hailin Fu found the chemical system that behaves like cell organelles with well-defined segregated areas in a water-based solution by accident. She followed the science to the end though, and she describes her and her colleagues' journey of discovery in a new paper just published in Nature. It is quite rare to see a Nature article, with all'authors on the paper coming from the same institute.

Researchers from Fujitsu and QuTech have developed new and ultra-cold electronic circuits to control diamond-based quantum bits. As a result of their joint research project, it becomes possible to build larger quantum computers, through overcoming the 'wiring bottleneck', while maintaining high quality performance.

A TU/e and Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology-led collaboration involving researchers from around the world has the answer, and the why, and the results have just been published in the journal Science Advances. Electrons carry electrical energy, while vibrational energy is carried by phonons.

The brightness peak of the ring around M87's supermassive black hole has shifted 30 degrees counterclockwise in a year. This is shown in new images released by the Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration. The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration , with contributions by Dutch astronomers, has released new images of M87*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy Messier 87, using data from observations taken in April 2018.

Friction is responsible for nearly a quarter of all irreversible energy losses in the modern world's industry. That is why scientists worldwide are trying to find better ways to reduce these losses. An international group of authors including Igor Ostanin, Assistant Professor at the department of Engineering Technology, University of Twente, investigated the fundamental question of dynamic mechanisms of structural superlubricity (a vanishingly small friction, observed between the two molecularly smooth surfaces).

International research team succeeds for the first time in analysing different signals simultaneously A new method to study the signals associated with merging neutron stars can help researchers to collect data through multiple channels in parallel. The method was developed by an international team of scientists, including the Institute for Gravitational and Subatomic Physics (GRASP) , Utrecht University, and Nikhef.

Utrecht scientists, under the supervision of Marc-Etienne Moret, have discovered a new mechanism to build molecular catalysts. The new mechanism involves the earth-abundant metal nickel instead of precious metals that are often used as part of molecular catalysts. Moret: "This discovery initiates a new area of research that brings about a whole new concept for the design of more sustainable catalysts." In 2017, chemistry researcher Marc-Etienne Moret received an ERC Starting Grant  to study new catalysts with better properties.

New research has revealed that Rembrandt impregnated the canvas for his famous 1642 militia painting 'The Night Watch' with a lead-containing substance even before applying the first ground layer. Such lead-based impregnation has never before been observed with Rembrandt or his contemporaries. The discovery , published today in Science Advances, underlines Rembrandt's inventive way of working, in which he did not shy away from using new techniques.

Quantum scientists, including Nigel Hussey of Radboud University, have discovered a rare phenomenon that could hold the key to creating a 'perfect switch' in quantum devices which flips between being an insulator and superconductor. The research, published in Science , found these two opposing electronic states exist within purple bronze, a unique one-dimensional metal composed of individual conducting chains of atoms.

Quantum physicists at Delft University of Technology have shown that it's possible to control and manipulate spin waves on a chip using superconductors for the first time. These tiny waves in magnets may offer an alternative to electronics in the future, interesting for energy-efficient information technology or connecting pieces in a quantum computer, for example.

Currently, many (nano)structures are grown in layers, one above the other, but their ordering on the atomic scale is generally far from perfect.  The researchers aim for a better understanding of these processes that can eventually lead to smaller, faster and overall better nanotechnology and have, in a worldwide first observation, discovered pre-solidification in droplet mixture.

Researchers from Delft established a way to address many quantum dots with only a few control lines using a chessboard-like method. This enabled the operation of the largest gate-defined quantum dot system ever. Their result is an important step in the development of scalable quantum systems for practical quantum technology.

In an international collaboration involving the University of Twente and universities in Finland and Australia, researchers have succeeded in reprogramming the capsids of plant viruses into different shapes. They did this by folding nanoscale DNA structures into moulds around which the capsids form.

Observations with the James Webb Space Telescope have for the first time revealed the presence of water in the inner disk around a young star where giant planets have already formed further away. The research took place within the MINDS collaboration, led by the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg, Germany, and including astronomers from Radboud University, the University of Groningen, and Leiden University.

A new physics model could help gain more insight into the events surrounding the birth of the universe. Combining principles of holography and string theory, researchers from Utrecht University, together with colleagues from other universities and Cern, developed the model that could potentially elucidate how the universe expanded, and gained enough heat in the final phase before the Big Bang.

Researchers from the Complex Photonic Systems (COPS) group used two layers of random materials to encrypt and decrypt a message sent via light communication. With that, they hid the sender and receiver simultaneously, and only when the light passed through both layers was the message received. The research team published their findings in the journal Optics Express, and believes this proof of concept has applications in visible light communication systems, light fidelity (LiFi), and optical fibre communications.

PhD candidate Vincent Debets investigated which elements are important for the movement behavior of a cancer cell. Why do tumor cells stay put under certain conditions, but become mobile in others, raising the prospect of metastasis? TU/e researcher Vincent Debets looked at the cells in the human body from a physics perspective and developed a unique model designed to boost our understanding of complex cell movements.

In a ground-breaking experiment, scientists from the University of Groningen, together with colleagues from HFML-FELIX, University of Twente and the Harbin Institute of Technology (China), have discovered the existence of a superconductive state that was first predicted in 2017. In this week's edition of Nature, they present evidence for a special variant of the so-called FFLO superconducting state, a discovery that could have significant applications, particularly in the field of superconducting electronics.

It seems quantum mechanics and thermodynamics cannot be true simultaneously. In a new publication, UT researchers use photons in an optical chip to demonstrate how both theories can be true at the same time. They recently published their results in the scientific journal Nature Communications. In quantum mechanics, time can be reversed and information is always preserved.