Think, for a second, about the size of a red blood cell. Now, imagine anything that’s about 7,000 times smaller. That would be a nanometer. It’s also representative of the world in which a host of University of Alabama researchers are involved.
Human hearing can only discern the location of a noise to a certain level–beyond that we have to rely on technology. Although having the ability to locate a sound source could be vital for emergency location after a disaster, traditional sensors are too cumbersome and difficult to use in such situations.
One of the world’s most closely monitored experiments recently yielded its initial findings. The results, made public April 11, were made possible, in part, by three University of Alabama scientists who developed one of the primary sets of code used in key portions of the internationally-known effort’s computer analysis.
Researchers at The University of Alabama are offering clues as to why some people appear to have a higher risk of developing Parkinson’s disease following exposure to a widely used chemical weed killer.
From national security issues, to high oil prices, to environmental impacts, reasons for the growing search for alternative energy sources are broad-based. Now, a national security laboratory, with an assist from a University of Alabama engineer, is using what appear to be giant, steel traffic cones to try and turn nuclear fusion into a realistic energy alternative.
Dr. Hideo Fujiwara, a University of Alabama physicist, has sung the praises of the campus’ information storage research center to some of the world’s biggest electronic names, but he can frequently be heard singing a different tune.
Shiny, black magnetic films, about the size of a penny and made by University of Alabama researchers, are central to a discovery of how to conduct resistance-free electricity in a manner previously thought impossible.
University of Alabama astronomers and their students are gaining regular access to two mountaintop-based telescopes, including one in the southern hemisphere, without leaving campus.
With Hurricane Katrina’s intense destruction in 2005, government officials and private citizens can no longer take public infrastructure for granted. Through a series of research projects, The University of Alabama’s Aging Infrastructure Systems Center for Excellence is improving the productivity and resilience of aging assets in America.
Thirteen years ago Dr. Marcus Brown, associate professor of computer science at The University of Alabama, and one of his now former graduate students were awarded a patent for their novel invention which identifies a person by how they type their name.