He committed suicide at 26, while under federal indictment for downloading research materials from an academic website and was facing the real possibility of prison time.

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Goldman Sachs analyst James Covello this morning cut his rating on Applied Materials to Sell from Neutral, while reducing his stance on Lam Research to Neutral from Buy, asserting that a recent rally in semiconductor equipment shares has created significant downside risk for the group.

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"The Critical Materials Institute will bring together the best and brightest research minds from universities, national laboratories and the private sector to find innovative technology solutions that will help us avoid a supply shortage that would threaten our clean energy industry as well as our security interests, " he said in a statement.

BBC: US to build $120m rare earth research institute

The Cornell Center for Materials Research assembles atoms in ways never seen in nature for applications ranging from computer memory to replacement body parts.

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The research, which was completed in conjunction with scientists from the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology ( Empa) is published in the journal Nature.

CNN: World's smallest car fuels nanotech advance

Citigroup analyst Terence Whalen this morning turned cautious on the semiconductor equipment sector, cutting his rating on Lam Research to Hold from Buy, and trimming estimates on Lam, KLA-Tencor and Applied Materials.

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