Nanopillared

While the purification of wastewater once just involved the removal of traditional pollutants, it now also entails the removal of microplastic particles. A new powder reportedly does the job much quicker and more thoroughly than has previously been possible.Developed by a team of scientists at Australia's RMIT University, the powder would ideally get mixed into untreated wastewater at existing treatment plants. And while it just looks like a plain white powder to the naked eye, it's actually made up of microscopic,…

“Optical tweezers” – systems that focus light to trap and manipulate individual atoms – could pave the way for powerful quantum devices, but they can be a little cumbersome. Researchers have now developed a simplified, smaller design for optical tweezers that uses a metasurface lens studded with millions of tiny pillars.Given their tiny size, individual atoms are notoriously tricky to see and manipulate, but finding ways to do so would be extremely useful. The invention of the laser in the 1960s eventually led to the…