To fabricate ever smaller electronic components, new materials are in great demand – for example, ultra-thin layers of carbon known as graphene. As part of an international collaboration, Empa researchers are developing new methods to “grow” these layers in a tailored way on surfaces. The current issue of EmpaNews covers this topic as well as, of course, much more.

We hope you will enjoy reading our magazine!

Further Information: PDF of the article

Focus: Smart Materials

And since it is our goal to provide intelligent reading material, for once we’ve taken that task literally – and thus the current Focus section on “smart” materials. They’re also the topic of the National Research Programme NRP 62, which started early 2010 and in which Empa is quite successfully represented.

Further Information: PDF of the Focus

         
And also in this issue:

            
Research and Development

• Energy-saving lamp wins
  Empa researchers have investigated the eco-balance of various lighting technologies. They considered not only the lamps’ own energy consumption using different electricity mixes, but also aspects related to their manufacture and disposal. The clear-cut result: the energy-saving lamp comes out ahead.
  Further Information: PDF of the article
• Fire in the building!
  Empa has been burning for 40 years. In the Fire Technology Laboratory at Dübendorf, the most varied components are turned into ashes. This is done not just to gain knowledge about how materials and components behave when burning, but also to optimise them. In future, even computer models should help predict the materials' behaviour in the event of fire.
  Further Information: PDF of the article

Knowledge and technology transfer

• “You don’t win a prize everyday”
  A new bed imitating the movements of healthy people when sleeping should help protect bedridden patients from decubitus ulcers, better known as bedsores, and at the same time unburden health-care personnel. Behind this project, which recently won several start-up awards, is Michael Sauter, a mechanical engineer and young entrepreneur who in May 2009 founded his own company “compliant concept”, supported by Empa’s glaTec technology centre.
  Further Information: PDF of the article