pale blue dot
An essential step towards a carbon-neutral future could be reached through dispersed power grids, featuring networks of local-scale renewable energy and battery storage plants. To prevent these power grids from damaging themselves and their surroundings when electrical faults arise, they must be integrated with “circuit breakers”, which temporarily interrupt the current flowing through them. However, …
Continue reading “An Innovative Medium-Voltage DC Circuit Breaker for Renewable Power Grids”
When Earth’s magnetic field which forms the Earth’s magnetosphere is struck by violent geomagnetic storms, narrow streams of fast-moving ions can form, which pose serious threats to vital satellite systems. Through her research, Dr. Amy Keesee at the University of New Hampshire is shedding new light on how these streams originate, by picking up the …
Continue reading “Scientists are mapping the Earth’s Magnetosphere with Energetic Atoms”
A combination of dwindling oil reserves and increasing pollution means that the plastic industry must be urgently transformed before it’s too late. The efforts of researchers, including Dr. Jinwen Zhang and his colleagues at Washington State University, mean that solutions are becoming increasingly available. Through the development of malleable and self-healable plastics, created from both …
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Organic semiconductors form the cornerstone of modern technologies, powering the screens we use in many of our digital devices. On top of this, they are also key materials in organic solar cells and medical biosensing devices, amongst other innovative applications. Dr. Seyhan Salman and her colleagues at Clark Atlanta University have been investigating organic semiconductors …
Continue reading “Advancing Organic Semiconductors through Computational Research”
Humans have relied on cotton’s textile fiber for nearly seven millennia. However, utilizing cottonseed as food has been a long and unfulfilled goal of many plant breeders. Along with its abundant, high-quality protein, cottonseed also contains gossypol – a toxic chemical that renders the seed inedible. Cottonseed’s fate as a mostly unusable by-product seemed sealed …
Continue reading “Bioengineered Cotton Could Help Solve World Hunger”
Large-scale circulation patterns can be found throughout Earth’s oceans and atmosphere, and play a crucial role in maintaining the stability of regional climates. As the climate warms, researchers find that these patterns are experiencing a fundamental transformation, which can result in catastrophic consequences. According to scientists, these changes could lead to hotter, drier conditions in …
The climate crisis and the chemistry of the oceans are inextricably connected. The oceans have absorbed close to a third of our carbon dioxide emissions since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, leading to an increasingly acidic environment (hence the term, Ocean Acidification) and making it more difficult for organisms such as corals, mollusks, and …
Continue reading “Ocean Acidification: Mapping the Impact of Carbon Emissions on the Oceans”
Quasicrystals are among the newest and most exciting discoveries in the wider field of materials physics – but to date, many aspects of their exotic physical properties remain entirely unexplored. Since soon after their initial discovery, Dr. Zbigniew Stadnik at the University of Ottawa has made important contributions to our understanding of quasicrystals, including their …
Pesticides may be essential in ensuring abundant and healthy yields of many crops, but so far, the techniques used to spray them have led to considerable environmental damage. In his research, Dr. Mark Gleason, a plant pathologist at Iowa State University, assesses the performance of new technologies that can deploy pesticides on apple trees in …
Continue reading “Sustainable Pesticide Use with Intelligent Spraying”
What is the hardest material on Earth? Traditionally, because of its extreme hardness, diamond is used as a cutting material in a multitude of fields, from aerospace engineering to geothermal energy. Recently, using ultra-high pressures and temperatures, scientists have created a new form of diamond, which is now the hardest material known to humankind.
