Feb 1, 2018 | Innovative ice screws
On the mountain, ice screws must be able to reliably hold the weight of a climber – even in free fall if need be. Investigations at Empa will show whether or not a newly developed screw will not slip out of the ice even...
Jan 29, 2018 | Electro-osmotic textiles for athletes
To keep the body warm and dry during winter sports, high-performance clothing is a must. The demands on these textiles are high, as a person sweats up to one liter per hour on his upper body alone when skiing. A new...
Jan 23, 2018 | Hazardous industrial batteries in e-cigarettes
E-cigarettes often draw their energy from lithium-ion batteries of the type 18650, but these batteries are extremely dangerous without a protective cover. Empa scientist Marcel Held demonstrates this fact with an...
Jan 18, 2018 | Michel Calame: boundaries under scrutiny
Michel Calame is Head of Empa's Transport at Nanoscale Interfaces lab. The name says it all: the physicist aims to conduct research at the interface between physics and biology, where damp systems meet dry electronics...
Jan 17, 2018 | Standardized sweating at Empa
Empa's sweat torso now meets the ISO standard. How protective clothing affects the human body can be investigated in future with Empa's torso in a standardized way.
Jan 15, 2018 | Aerobrick: A brick with a world record
Better thermal insulation means lower heating costs – but this should not be at the expense of exciting architecture. A new type of brick filled with aerogel could make thin and highly insulating walls possible in the...
Jan 11, 2018 | Lead halide quantum dots
A type of quantum dot that has been intensively studied in recent years can reproduce light in every colour and is very bright. An international research team including scientists from Empa has now discovered why this is...