Tech

The U.S. may be on the verge of an economy driven by methane, the primary component of natural gas, which burns cleaner than coal and is undergoing a production boom. It has poised the country as a top fuel producer globally, but recent research is casting serious doubts over just how climate-friendly it is, according to an article in Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly news magazine of the American Chemical Society.

Chemists at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum have made a decisive step towards more cost-efficient regenerative fuel cells and rechargeable metal-air batteries. They developed a new type of catalyst on the basis of carbon, which can facilitate two opposite reactions: electrolysis of water and combustion of hydrogen with oxygen. A catalyst of this kind might make the storage of wind and solar energy and the manufacture of cost-efficient batteries, for example for electric cars, possible. The team published their report in the "International Edition" of the magazine "Angewandte Chemie".

University of Southampton researchers, with assistance from the Ministry of Defence, have conducted the first study to identify the hearing requirements of British soldiers fighting on the frontline.

The study, which provides an important and novel insight into the frontline experiences of British infantry personnel, identified 17 'auditory tasks', such as 'hearing grid references' and 'locating enemy movement in maize fields', carried out on operational duties abroad.

Solar power and other sources of renewable energy can help combat global warming but they have a drawback: they don't produce energy as predictably as plants powered by oil, coal or natural gas. Solar panels only produce electricity when the sun is shining, and wind turbines are only productive when the wind is brisk.

Ideally, alternative energy sources would be complemented with massive systems to store and dispense power – think batteries on steroids. Reversible fuel cells have been envisioned as one such storage solution.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. (http://www.ucr.edu) — Researchers at the University of California, Riverside's Bourns College of Engineering have created a lithium ion battery that outperforms the current industry standard by three times. The key material: sand. Yes, sand.

"This is the holy grail – a low cost, non-toxic, environmentally friendly way to produce high performance lithium ion battery anodes," said Zachary Favors, a graduate student working with Cengiz and Mihri Ozkan, both engineering professors at UC Riverside.

University of Iowa researchers have discovered a biomarker that could give expecting mothers and their doctors the first simple blood test to reliably predict that a pregnant woman may develop preeclampsia, at least as early as 6 weeks into the pregnancy.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. — A perspective article published last month by University of California, Riverside chemists in the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters was selected as an Editors Choice—an honor only a handful of research papers receive. The perspective reviews the chemists' work on "singlet fission," a process in which a single photon generates a pair of excited states. This 1->2 conversion process, as it is known, has the potential to boost solar cell efficiency by as much as 30 percent.

LIVERMORE, Calif. — A study by researchers at Sandia National Laboratories concludes that a number of existing gas stations in California can safely store and dispense hydrogen, suggesting a broader network of hydrogen fueling stations may be within reach.

Everybody has experienced this: You aren't careful for just one moment and suddenly you run into the edge of a table. At first, it hurts. A little later, a bruise starts to appear. What falls into the category of "nothing bad, but aggravating" in the case of a table, takes on a new dimension when the colliding partner is a robot, because such a collision can injure humans seriously. That is why these mechanical assistants usually still work behind protective barriers.

Scientists working with data from NASA's Aquarius instrument have released worldwide maps of soil moisture, showing how the wetness of the land fluctuates with the seasons and weather phenomena.

RICHLAND, Wash. – The lithium-ion batteries that power our laptops and electric vehicles could store more energy and run longer on a single charge with the help of a sponge-like silicon material.

Researchers developed the porous material to replace the graphite traditionally used in one of the battery's electrodes, as silicon has more than 10 times the energy storage capacity of graphite. A paper describing the material's performance as a lithium-ion battery electrode was published today in Nature Communications.

The number of children with atopic dermatitis, often referred to as eczema, is on the rise. Some estimate that one in five children in the U.S. now suffers from the painful, itchy skin condition. In an effort to control their symptoms, many children are prescribed powerful medications like immunosuppressants or topical steroids.

With an article published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in the United States of America (PNAS), a thirteen-year-long mystery that has involved a long series of researchers at both Linköping University and Acreo Swedish ICT has finally been solved.

A new UBC Sauder School of Business study shows that teenagers who work at summer or evening jobs gain a competitive advantage later in life. Developing early knowledge of the working world and how to manage in it, they are more likely to find good employment and earn more money in the future.

A New York University College of Nursing (NYUCN) research team found that a social/behavioral intervention vastly increased the number of African American and Latino individuals living with HIV/AIDS who enrolled in HIV/AIDS medical studies. The intervention, designed by researchers at the NYUCN's Center for Drug Use and HIV Research (CDUHR), found that nine out of ten participants who were found eligible for studies decided to enroll, compared to zero participants among a control group.