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Energy

Calorie labelling linked to 2% average reduction in energy content of menu items

Calorie labelling, which became law in April 2022 in England, is associated with only a small (2%) average reduction in the energy content of food that is available away from home, finds research published in the open access journal BMJ Public Health. And these changes are primarily due to swapping in slightly lower calorie items, rather than reformulating existing ones, with no changes observed in continuously available items. The impact on population health is likely to be “moderate to limited,” conclude the researchers. Eating at restaurants, fast food outlets, and ordering takeaways, collectively known as out-of-home food outlets, is common and associated with ...

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Energy

Flash Joule heating lights up lithium extraction from ores

A new one-step, water- acid- and alkali-free method for extracting high-purity lithium from spodumene ore has the potential to transform critical metal processing and enhance renewable energy supply chains. This study is set to be published in Science Advances Oct. 3, 2025. As the demand for lithium continues to rise, particularly for use in electric cars, smartphones and power storage, current extraction methods are struggling to keep pace. Extracting lithium from salty water is a lengthy process, and traditional methods that use heat and chemicals ...

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Energy

Rice University announces second cohort of Chevron Energy Graduate Fellows

Rice University has named 10 graduate students as recipients of the 2025-26 Chevron Energy Graduate Fellowships, a program created through a partnership between the Rice Sustainability Institute and Chevron. Each fellow receives a $10,000 award to support research advancing scalable energy innovations that reduce emissions, accelerate low-carbon technologies and improve the reliability and efficiency of current and future energy systems. The fellowship program, launched last year, reflects a shared commitment ...

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Energy

Smarter battery tech knows whether your EV will make it home

Current battery management systems might report a car is 40% charged but drivers have to guess whether they can go 100 kilometers over hills with the heater running. Engineers at the University of California, Riverside want to take the guesswork out of it. They’ve developed a new diagnostic metric called the State of Mission, or SOM, designed to answer a practical question: Can this battery, in its current state, safely and successfully power a specific task? SOM uses both battery data and environmental factors like traffic patterns, elevation changes, or ambient temperature to generate real-time, task-specific predictions. “SOM fills that gap,” said Mihri Ozkan, a ...

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Energy

Rice physicists’ new lab focused on emergent magnetic materials, funded by Department of Energy

Four physicists from Rice University have received a $4.4 million grant over three years from the U.S. Department of Energy to establish the Rice Laboratory for Emergent Magnetic Materials (RLEMM). This new research center will investigate the fundamental interactions of magnetism and its role in next-generation technologies. The award will support collaborative research led by principal investigator Pengcheng Dai along with co-investigators Ming Yi, Emilia Morosan and Qimiao Si. Their focus is on emergent phases of matter such as unconventional superconductivity, quantum ...

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Energy

A new comprehensive safety assessment framework for liquid hydrogen storage systems in UAVs

Aviation accounts for approximately 12% of global carbon dioxide emissions. With intensifying climate change and environmental issues, the aviation industry is searching for greener propulsion systems. For unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), which have wide applications in military, logistics, and agriculture, research has turned towards hydrogen propulsion systems. Hydrogen is a clean fuel that produces only water during combustion, representing a promising alternative to conventional fossil fuels. However, hydrogen has low volumetric energy density, meaning larger volumes are required to produce the same energy as conventional ...

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Energy

Bio-based PEF shows exceptional hydrogen barrier potential for high-pressure storage

Ningbo / Qingdao, 18 September 2025 — A new computational study reveals that polyethylene furanoate (PEF) — a bio-based polyester — has markedly stronger resistance to hydrogen permeation than commonly used polyamide 6 (PA6) and polyethylene (PE). The work, published in AI & Materials, uses density functional theory (DFT), revised force-field molecular dynamics (MD), Grand Canonical Monte Carlo (GCMC), and nudged elastic band (NEB) calculations to quantify the crystallographic origins of PEF’s superior barrier performance, pointing ...

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Energy

Overcoming the barriers of hydrogen storage with a low-temperature hydrogen battery

A hydrogen battery that operates at just 90 °C has been developed by researchers from Japan, overcoming the high-temperature and low-capacity limits of earlier methods. The device works by moving hydride ions through a solid electrolyte, allowing magnesium hydride, which acts as the anode, to repeatedly store and release hydrogen at full capacity. This battery offers a practical way to store hydrogen fuel, paving the way for hydrogen-powered vehicles and clean energy systems. One of the most pressing challenges facing the use of hydrogen ...

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Energy

Breakthrough advances sodium-based battery design

All-solid-state batteries are safe, powerful ways to power EVs and electronics and store electricity from the energy grid, but the lithium used to build them is rare, expensive and can be environmentally devastating to extract. Sodium is an inexpensive, plentiful, less-destructive alternative, but the all-solid-state batteries they create currently don’t work as well at room temperature. “It’s not a matter of sodium versus lithium. We need both. When we think about tomorrow’s energy storage solutions, we should imagine the same gigafactory can produce products based on both lithium and sodium chemistries,” ...

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Energy

Researcher develop the first hydride ion prototype battery

Hydride ion (H⁻), with their low mass and high redox potential, are considered promising charge carriers for next-generation electrochemical devices. However, the lack of efficient electrolyte with fast hydride ion conductivity, thermal stability, and electrode compatibility has hindered their practical applications. In a study published in Nature, Prof. CHEN Ping’s group from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) developed a novel core–shell hydride ion electrolyte, and constructed the first rechargeable hydride ion ...

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Energy

Revolutionary scandium doping technique extends sodium-ion battery life

Because lithium is relatively scarce and sodium is abundant in Earth’s crust, sodium-ion batteries are being investigated as viable cost-effective alternatives to the widely used lithium-ion batteries. In these batteries, the choice of cathode material primarily influences battery capacity and stability. Layered sodium manganese oxides (Na2/3MnO2) have attracted significant attention in recent years as cathode materials for high-capacity sodium-ion batteries without using any rare-earth metals. However, while these materials ...

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Energy

Monitoring underwater bridge tunnels with the help of high-energy muons

WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2025 – Over 200 underwater bridge tunnels exist for vehicular traffic around the world, providing connectivity between cities. Once constructed, however, these tunnels are difficult to monitor and maintain, often requiring shutdowns or invasive methods that pose structural risks. Muography — an imaging technique using high-energy particles, called muons, which can traverse hundreds of meters within the earth — can provide a noninvasive approach to examining subterranean infrastructure. In the Journal of Applied Physics, by AIP Publishing, ...

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Energy

Multi-energy X-ray curved surface imaging-with multi-layer in-situ grown scintillators

As a promising technology, multi-energy X-ray imaging technology is expected to be applied for many key fields such as distinguishing the subtle differences in material composition and density, like showing biological skeleton and muscle defects. However, the current multi-energy X-ray imaging technology usually has a high threshold in material selection and device design. To ensure that the imaging resolution reaches the expected level, it is necessary to efficiently couple the multi-layer scintillators with specific energy X-ray response characteristics. ...

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Energy

Ohio State scientists advance focus on nuclear propulsion

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New developments in nuclear thermal propulsion technologies may soon enable advanced space missions to the farthest reaches of the solar system. Leading these advances are researchers at The Ohio State University: Engineers are developing a nuclear propulsion system that uses liquid uranium to directly heat rocket propellant as an alternative to solid fuel elements used by traditional nuclear propulsion systems. Their concept, called the centrifugal nuclear thermal rocket (CNTR), is specially designed to improve rocket performance while simultaneously minimizing any engine risk. While ...

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Energy

Durham University scientists play key role in testing superconducting materials for world’s largest fusion energy project

-With images- Durham University scientists have completed one of the largest quality verification programmes ever carried out on superconducting materials, helping to ensure the success of the world’s biggest fusion energy experiment ITER. Their findings, published in Superconductor Science and Technology, shed light not only on the quality of the wires themselves but also on how to best test them, providing crucial knowledge for scientists to make fusion energy a reality. Fusion (the process that powers the Sun) has long been described as the holy grail of clean energy. It offers the promise of a virtually limitless power source with no carbon emissions ...

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Energy

New ways of producing methanol from electricity and biomass

In future, it could become easier to manufacture methanol from biomass decentrally on site. Researchers at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) are proposing a method with which raw and waste materials from plants can be processed in a self-contained procedure under mild reaction conditions. This method means that the complex drying and transportation of biomass to large biomass gasification plants becomes superfluous. The results were published in the journal Green Chemistry. Methanol is a versatile basic chemical and promising energy carrier – for example, as a drop-in fuel that can be used directly in ...

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Energy

First 3D real-time imaging of hydrogen’s effect on stainless steel defects opens the way to a safer hydrogen economy

A study led by University of Oxford and Brookhaven National Laboratory researchers has uncovered how exposure to hydrogen atoms dynamically alters the internal structure of stainless steel. The findings reveal that hydrogen allows internal defects in steel to move in ways not normally possible – which can lead to unexpected failure. This discovery offers vital insights that could help make hydrogen fuel systems safer and more reliable, from aircraft and fusion reactors to pipelines and storage tanks. The study has been published today (9 Sept) ...

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Energy

Screening anionic groups within zwitterionic additives for eliminating hydrogen evolution and dendrites in aqueous zinc ion batteries

As global demand grows for safe, low-cost, and sustainable energy storage technologies, aqueous zinc-ion batteries (AZIBs) have gained increasing attention due to their high theoretical capacity, environmental friendliness, and intrinsic safety. However, their practical application has long been hindered by two major challenges: uncontrolled zinc dendrite growth and hydrogen evolution reactions (HER), both of which degrade battery performance and lifespan. Now, a collaborative research team from Nanjing University, The University of Queensland, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University has developed an ...

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Energy

Researchers discover massive geo-hydrogen source to the west of the Mussau Trench

Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the solar system. As a source of clean energy, hydrogen is well-suited for sustainable development, and Earth is a natural hydrogen factory. However, most hydrogen vents reported to date are small, and the geological processes responsible for hydrogen formation—as well as the quantities that can be preserved in geological settings—remain unclear. To better understand the availability of geological hydrogen, researchers from the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IOCAS) and their collaborators discovered and analyzed a large pipe swarm—a ...

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Energy

Researchers achieve light-induced heterolytic hydrogen dissociation at ambient temperature

In a study published in Science on September 4, a research team led by Prof. WANG Feng from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with Prof. Paolo Fornasiero from the University of Trieste in Italy, has developed a photochemical strategy for heterolytic hydrogen (H2) dissociation at ambient temperature, a long-standing challenge in H2 activation chemistry. Hydrogenation is one of the most fundamental reactions in the ...

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Energy

Efficient ethane separation from natural gas using ZIF-8 slurry

A team from China University of Petroleum (Beijing), led by Professors Guangjin Chen and Chun Deng, has developed a novel slurry-based absorption–adsorption–desorption process for natural gas separation, combining gas–liquid equilibrium experiments with mathematical modeling. “What excites us is that our model predictions closely matched the experimental data, with an average relative error of only about 3%,” said Prof. Deng. “This gives us confidence to apply the process in practical gas separation.” By embedding the model into a multi-objective optimization framework ...

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Energy

Mizzou at the forefront of using hydrogen energy safely

Researchers at the University of Missouri are working to make hydrogen energy as safe as possible. As more countries and industries invest heavily in cleaner, renewable energy, hydrogen-powered factories and vehicles are gaining in popularity. But hydrogen fuel comes with risks — leaks can lead to explosions, accidents and environmental harm. Most hydrogen-detecting sensors on the market are expensive, can’t operate continuously and aren’t sensitive enough to detect tiny leaks quickly. That’s why Mizzou’s Xiangqun Zeng and her team in the College of Engineering set out to design the ideal hydrogen sensor, focusing on six traits: sensitivity, ...

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Energy

Faraday Institution commits a further £9M to battery research to deliver commercial impact

HARWELL, UK (3 September 2025) The Faraday Institution has announced a £9 million commitment to build on its application-inspired research programme to deliver the battery innovations of tomorrow. The two new projects, that will begin in October 2025, include, for the first time, a Faraday Institution project to advance the scientific understanding of battery formation, ageing and testing -- a stage at the end of the battery manufacturing process. The project will aim to formulate new protocols to reduce battery manufacturing time and energy consumption in gigafactories. This is the first of a number of new initiatives by the Faraday Institution ...

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Energy

New method could monitor corrosion and cracking in a nuclear reactor

MIT researchers have developed a technique that enables real-time, 3D monitoring of corrosion, cracking, and other material failure processes inside a nuclear reactor environment. This could allow engineers and scientists to design safer nuclear reactors that also deliver higher performance for applications like electricity generation and naval vessel propulsion. During their experiments, the researchers utilized extremely powerful X-rays to mimic the behavior of neutrons interacting with a material inside a nuclear reactor. They found that adding a buffer layer of silicon dioxide between the material and ...

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Energy

Overcoming disordered energy in light-matter interactions

Polaritons are formed by the strong coupling of light and matter. When they mix together, all the matter is excited simultaneously – referred to as delocalization. This delocalization has the unique ability to relay energy between matter that is otherwise not possible. Disordered energy is ubiquitous in nature and the universe. Disordered energy is less organized and less available to do work, such as with heat dissipation. Even in plants, disorder can ruin effective energy transfer. In the context of polaritons, as disorder increases, it can negatively affect light-matter ...

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