Better battery electrode
A novel electrode for lithium-ion batteries could provide greater power and faster charging. The approach stacks thin 2D materials in a vertical alignment, creating a ‘fast lane’ for ions to travel through the electrode (Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2212777119). The result is an electrode that could potentially facilitate twice the range on a single charge for an EV, compared with a conventional battery design.
Food for feed
Global food supply could benefit if more byproducts were directed towards feeding animals, according to a new study. Today, up to 40% of land and 30% of cereal crop production is used for animal feeds, and 23% of captured fish goes to ‘non-food’ uses, such as fish and livestock feeds.
£4.6m for microbe research
Antimicrobial resistance has been identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a top ten threat facing humanity.
Bacterial motion
Researchers in the US have solved a decades-old mystery about how certain species of bacteria are able to move. Some bacteria push themselves forward by coiling long, threadlike appendages – flagella – into corkscrew shapes that act as makeshift propellers. But how exactly they do this has baffled scientists, because the ‘propellers’ are made of a single protein.
Greener hydrogen
Green hydrogen – produced by water electrolysis using renewable energy – is the ultimate clean energy. But it depends on the availability of freshwater. Now Kevin Li and his team from the University of Melbourne, Australia, has designed a prototype electrolyser that can produce high purity hydrogen from moisture in the air without consuming liquid water.
Layering cybersecurity
Ransomware is not a new phenomenon, but the scale of attacks has accelerated both in sophistication and frequency. Ransomware incidents handled by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) increased from 326 in 2020 to 654 in 2021. Cybersecurity is a constant threat for businesses of all sizes, across all industries.
Moxie-gen for Mars
Perseverance touched down on the red planet on 12 February, 2021, carrying with it an experimental device about the size of car battery to make oxygen. Now in September, researchers report that they have successfully run this process on Mars (Sci. Adv., 2022, 8, eabp8636).
Ammonia strategy
Everyone it seems has a ‘Hydrogen Strategy’ in the works. The EU’s Green Deal, the US Department of Energy’s Hydrogen Program Plan and of course the UK’s Hydrogen Strategy. So here comes the latest twist: to deliver hydrogen to the market in the form of ammonia.
Travelling light
Future modes of transport won’t just rely on batteries. New types of fuel that are not derived from crude oil are increasingly in demand, Lou Reade reports
Pharma skill shortage
The UK pharmaceutical sector continues to fall short on job applicants with recent data showing a 41% decline in people applying for vacancies between May 2022 and June 2022, threatening the UK’s status as a global pharmaceuticals leader. That’s according to the latest data from the network of job boards, Broadbean Technology.