Blog Articles

Ultrathin self-healing polymers create new, sustainable water-resistant coatings

By Xi Peng posted 2 days ago
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Researchers have found a way to make ultrathin surface coatings robust enough to survive scratches and dings. The new material, developed by merging thin-film and self-healing technologies, has an almost endless list of potential applications, including self-cleaning, anti-icing, anti-fogging, anti-bacterial, anti-fouling and enhanced heat exchange coatings, researchers said. Read more here . #News #Polymer #Coating #Ultrathin #Self-healing ​​​​​
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Novel Polymer Could Boost Performance of Organic and Perovskite Solar Cells

By Joanne Dawson posted 2 days ago
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Novel Polymer Could Boost Performance of Organic and Perovskite Solar Cells. Skoltech researchers, along with colleagues from the RAS Institute for Problems of Chemical Physics, have synthesized a new conjugated polymer for organic electronics using two different chemical reactions and shown the impact of the two methods on its performance in organic and perovskite solar cells. Perovskite solar cells have reached impressive certified record efficiencies, but long-term stability remains an issue. Recent research has shown that device stability can be improved by covering the photoactive perovskite material with a charge-extraction layer that provides efficient ...
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Making Hydrogen with Mining Waste

By Joanne Dawson posted 2 days ago
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Making Hydrogen with Mining Waste. A group of Queensland researchers have used mining waste to make a catalyst that could render hydrogen fuel production cheaper and more efficient. Hydrogen gas, which can be made by electrolysing water, should be a critical clean fuel by mid-century. The electrolysis process needs metals to catalyse it – and generally, expensive precious metals do a better job as catalysts. A paper published in Advanced Energy & Sustainability Research describes a cheaper type of hydrogen catalyst. #News #Hydrogen #Waste #Energy #Catalyst #GreenTechnology #Nanotechnology ​​​​​​​
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Dalhousie University Research Explores use of Recycled Gypsum in Concrete

By Joanne Dawson posted 2 days ago
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Dalhousie University Research Explores use of Recycled Gypsum in Concrete. The Gypsum Association (GA)—in partnership with Divert NS, in Nova Scotia, Canada— has announced its support for Dalhousie University Phase II research exploring the viability of using construction and demolition (C&D) waste gypsum in concrete. The research, led by Pedram Sadeghian, associate professor and Canada research chair in sustainable infrastructure at Dalhousie’s Centre for Innovation in Infrastructure (CII) in the department of civil and resource engineering, already shows promise as a means of diverting waste gypsum panels from landfills and into a new product. #News ...
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Smart Dental Implants

By Joanne Dawson posted 2 days ago
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Smart Dental Implants. Geelsu Hwang of the School of Dental Medicine and colleagues are developing a smart dental implant that resists bacterial growth and generates its own electricity through chewing and brushing to power a tissue-rejuvenating light. #News #Implant #Nanotechnology #Biomaterial #Piezoelectric ​​​​​
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Nissan and Waseda University - Testing Jointly Developed Recycling Process for Electrified Vehicle Motors

By Joanne Dawson posted 2 days ago
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Nissan and Waseda University - Testing Jointly Developed Recycling Process for Electrified Vehicle Motors. Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. and Waseda University today announced the start of testing in Japan of a jointly developed recycling process that efficiently recovers high-purity rare-earth compounds from electrified vehicle motor magnets. The testing is aimed at enabling practical application of the new process by the mid-2020s. The automotive industry is promoting vehicle electrification to tackle climate change and to realize a carbon-neutral society. Most motors in electrified vehicles use neodymium magnets, which contain scarce rare-earth metals such as neodymium ...
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NASA Selects Five U.S. Companies to Mature Artemis Lander Concepts

By Tom Johnson posted 3 days ago
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NASA has selected five U.S. companies to help the agency enable a steady pace of crewed trips to the lunar surface under the agency’s Artemis program. These companies will make advancements toward sustainable human landing system concepts, conduct risk-reduction activities, and provide feedback on NASA’s requirements to cultivate industry capabilities for crewed lunar landing missions. The awards under the Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships (NextSTEP-2) Appendix N broad agency announcement are firm fixed-price, milestone-based contracts. The total combined value for the awards is $146 million, and the work will be conducted over ...
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3D Printed Catalysts to Propel Hypersonic Flight

By Tom Johnson posted 3 days ago
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Ultra-efficient 3D printed catalysts could help solve the challenge of overheating in hypersonic aircraft and offer a revolutionary solution to thermal management across countless industries. Source #News #materials #catalyst #additivemanufacturing #3dprinting ​​​​​​​
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Terri Adams - scientific glassblower

By David Moore posted 4 days ago
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Video credit: UKRI Terri Adams is the Design and Fabrication Facility Manager, and the only scientific glassblower, for the University of Oxford. The main aspects of her job are design, fabrication and repair of scientific research glassware. Terri works with researchers to design and produce glassware that’s been used for similar research elsewhere or to create completely new glassware concepts for a new line of research. #News ​
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Improving Biomaterials Design for Bone Regeneration

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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Improving Biomaterials Design for Bone Regeneration. Bone injuries in the face and skull—known as craniomaxillofacial defects—can be caused by sports injuries, vehicle accidents, or battlefield injuries. Repairing such defects is complicated because different types of cells need to interact with each other. In a new study, published in Materialia , researchers are investigating the types of material used in reconstruction to see which one works best. #News #Scaffold #Biomaterials #ArtificialBone ​​​​
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Transforming 'Sewer Gas' into Clean Hydrogen Fuel

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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Transforming 'Sewer Gas' into Clean Hydrogen Fuel. Scientists have found a new chemical process to turn a stinky, toxic gas into a clean-burning fuel. The process, detailed recently in the American Chemical Society journal ACS Sustainable Chemical Engineering , turns hydrogen sulfide – more commonly called “sewer gas” – into hydrogen fuel. Hydrogen sulfide is emitted from manure piles and sewer pipes and is a key byproduct of industrial activities including refining oil and gas, producing paper and mining. The process detailed in this study uses relatively little energy and a relatively cheap material—the chemical iron sulfide with a trace amount of molybdenum ...
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Ground Coffee Cups Destined for Circular Economy

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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Ground Coffee Cups Destined for Circular Economy. Powder made from recycled takeaway coffee cups and other plastic waste may soon become a standard ingredient in some composite building materials. Experimental research by Victoria University’s (VU) College of Engineering and Science in Australila, has identified potential commercial uses for eco-bricks and panels containing significant quantities of processed plastic waste. #News #Construction #Bricks #Plastics #Waste #Composites ​​​​​​
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First UK Trial of Hydrogen Blended Gas Hailed a Success

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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First UK Trial of Hydrogen Blended Gas Hailed a Success. HyDeploy, the first project in the UK to blend hydrogen into a natural gas network, hailed a success in a report published on 8 September 2021. Hydrogen produces no carbon dioxide (CO2) when used, making it a viable alternative for heating homes and businesses to achieve the Government’s target of Net Zero carbon emissions by 2050, unlike natural gas, which is responsible for over 30% of carbon emissions. #News #Hydrogen #GreenTechnology #Energy #NetZero ​​​​​
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The World’s Largest Direct Air Capture and CO2 Storage Plant is ON

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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The World’s Largest Direct Air Capture and CO2 Storage Plant is ON. On the 8th September 2021, Carbfix started injecting CO2 captured by Climeworks’ Orca plant constituting the world’s first commercial direct air capture and storage chain. The Orca plant has the capacity of capturing 4,000 tons of CO2 per year, which is injected by Carbfix into nearby basaltic rock-formations to be permanently turned into stone. #News #GreenTechnology #CarbonCapture #ClimateChange #Sustainability ​​​​​
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MIT-Designed Project Achieves Major Advance Toward Fusion Energy

By Joanne Dawson posted 5 days ago
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MIT-Designed Project Achieves Major Advance Toward Fusion Energy. It was a moment three years in the making, based on intensive research and design work: On 5th September 2021, for the first time, a large high-temperature superconducting electromagnet was ramped up to a field strength of 20 tesla, the most powerful magnetic field of its kind ever created on Earth. That successful demonstration helps resolve the greatest uncertainty in the quest to build the world’s first fusion power plant that can produce more power than it consumes, according to the project’s leaders at MIT and startup company Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS). That advance paves the way for ...
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Lasers in the hands of the British Army

By Tom Johnson posted 5 days ago
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Three contracts worth around £72.5 million have been awarded to UK industry to produce advanced laser and radio frequency demonstrators as part of the the novel weapons programme (NWP) Known collectively as Directed Energy Weapons (DEW), these next-generation technologies could revolutionise the battlefield and reduce the risk of collateral damage. The systems are powered by electricity and operate without ammunition, significantly reducing operating costs, increasing platform endurance and providing unprecedented offensive and defensive flexibility to personnel on the frontline. Source #News #news #defence #weaponstechnology #article ​​​​​
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Ring-strain engineered polymers become endlessly recyclable – but are such materials ready to compete with commercial plastics?

By Xi Peng posted 5 days ago
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Chemically recyclable polymers with thermal stabilities comparable to those of commercial plastics have been created by scientists in the US. The materials can be broken down into their building blocks and then reassembled into new plastic many times over – a dream for sustainable plastics, though one whose commercial reality might still be a long way off. Read more details here . #News #Plastics #Recyclable #Sustainable ​​​
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Message in a bottle – the policies to deal with UK plastic waste

By Xi Peng posted 9 days ago
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With COP26 approaching and environmental targets becoming more pressing, a Westminster Forum event discussed some of the policies being proposed to deal with the UK’s plastic waste. Read more here . #Plastics #WasteManagement #Packaging #Recycling ​​​​
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Wooden Flooring that Produces Renewable Energy

By Joanne Dawson posted 9 days ago
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Functionalized Wood with Tunable Tribopolarity for Efficient Triboelectric Nanogenerators. Researchers from Switzerland have developed an energy-harvesting device that uses wooden flooring, with a combination of a silicone coating and embedded nanocrystals, to produce enough energy to power LED light bulbs and small electronics. Known as a nanogenerator, the device is based on sandwiching two pieces of wood between electrodes, where the wood becomes electrically charged due to contact and separation when stepped on through the 'triboelectric effect'. #News #GreenTechnology #Energy #Wood #Construction ​​​​​
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Heimdal Pulls CO2 and Cement-Making Materials Out of Seawater Using Renewable Energy

By Joanne Dawson posted 9 days ago
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Heimdal Pulls CO2 and Cement-Making Materials Out of Seawater Using Renewable Energy One of the consequences of rising CO2 levels in our atmosphere is that levels also rise proportionately in the ocean, harming wildlife and changing ecosystems. Heimdal is a startup working to pull that CO2 back out at scale using renewable energy and producing carbon-negative industrial materials, including limestone for making concrete, in the process and it has attracted significant funding even at its very early stage. #News #GreenTechnology #ClimateChange #Carbon #Sustainability #Cement #Concrete #Construction ​​​​​​​​​
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