Frozen noble gas in the accelerator

29-May-2024 - Researchers at European XFEL in Schenefeld near Hamburg have taken a closer look at the formation of the first crystallisation of nuclei in supercooled liquids. They found: The formation starts much later than previously assumed. The findings could help to better understand the creation of ice in ...

Fondant under the magnifying glass

New insights into the properties of sweet coating: The results could be used to optimize the industrial production process in the future

04-Sep-2023 - For many, the german sweet "Amerikaner" - a pastry with a sweet, whitish coating - is a childhood memory at the bakery. But there's a lot of physics and chemistry in the frosting. A team led by Thomas Vilgis at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research, together with colleagues from the ...

Revolutionary images of the birth of crystals

A team from the UNIGE has succeeded in visualizing crystal nucleation - the stage that precedes crystallization - that was invisible until now

26-Apr-2022 - At the interface between chemistry and physics, the process of crystallization is omnipresent in nature and industry. It is the basis for the formation of snowflakes but also of certain active ingredients used in pharmacology. For the phenomenon to occur for a given substance, it must first go ...

Perovskite Solar Cells: Insights into early stages of structure formation

Colloidal chemistry of perovskite precursor solutions investigated

25-Jun-2021 - Using small-angle scattering at the PTB X-ray beamline of BESSY II, an HZB team was able to experimentally investigate the colloidal chemistry of perovskite precursor solutions used for solar cell production. The results contribute to the targeted and systematic optimization of the manufacturing ...

Nanometre gaps can crystallise liquids

X-ray examination shows surprising coexistence of liquid and crystalline form

14-May-2019 - Very narrow gaps make liquids crystallise partially. X-ray investigations at DESY show that in gaps just a few molecule diameters wide both, liquid and crystal properties of a material can exist at the same time. The observation of this coexistence is important for all liquids in very small ...

Watching two-dimensional materials grow

30-Aug-2018 - Atomically thin crystals will play an ever greater role in future – but how can their crystallisation process be controlled? A new method is now opening up new possibilities. They are among the thinnest structures on earth: “two dimensional materials” are crystals which consist of only one or a ...

A new method to detect nucleation

27-Jul-2018 - As a solution evaporates, the dissolved chemicals concentrate until they begin forming a crystal through a process called nucleation. Industries that use small crystals in pharmaceuticals, food and microelectronics are seeking to understanding this nucleation event. Scientists studying nucleation ...

How order first appears in liquid crystals

24-May-2018 - Liquid crystals undergo a peculiar type of phase change. At a certain temperature, their cigar-shaped molecules go from a disordered jumble to a more orderly arrangement in which they all point more or less in the same direction. LCD televisions take advantage of that phase change to project ...

Faster characterization of organic salts

27-Mar-2018 - UZH researchers have developed a novel method that speeds up the process of determining crystal structures of organic salts and significantly reduces the effort required to do so. As about 40 percent of all active pharmaceutical ingredients are salts, this new crystallographic method is set to ...

New tool for structural biology

New method of crystallising large membrane proteins

08-Mar-2018 - ETH researchers have developed a new method of crystallising large membrane proteins in order to determine their structure. This will be of benefit to biological research and the pharmaceutical industry. Membrane-embedded proteins are an essential part of cells and any form of life. They not only ...