Molecular coating enhances organic solar cells

An electrode coating just one molecule thick can significantly enhance the performance of an organic photovoltaic cell, KAUST researchers have found. The coating outperforms the leading material currently used for this task and may pave the way for improvements in…

Srinivas Rangarajan wins NSF CAREER award for catalytic transfer hydrogenation research

Lehigh University computational chemical engineer to advance fundamental understanding of promising approach for safe, streamlined, cost-effective biomass and CO2 conversion

Bioinspired acid-catalyzed C2 prenylation of indole derivatives

Terpenoids are omnipresent in almost all living organisms. Prenylated indoles are prominent representatives that usually display potent medicinal properties (e.g. tryprostatin B). Therefore, significant efforts have been devoted to indole prenylation over the past decades. The known protocols often require…

ORNL names new Innovation Crossroads cohort of entrepreneurs

Six science and technology innovators from across the United States will join the fifth cohort of Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Innovation Crossroads program in June. As the Southeast’s only research and development program for entrepreneurs based at a U.S. Department…

Underground storage of carbon captured directly from air — green and economical

New study shows that geological storage of low-purity carbon dioxide mixed with oxygen and nitrogen from direct air capture is an environmentally friendly and economically viable approach to remove carbon from the atmosphere

Electrochemical cell harvests lithium from seawater

Lithium is a vital element in the batteries that power electric vehicles, but soaring lithium demand is expected to exhaust land-based reserves by 2080. KAUST researchers have now developed an economically viable system that can extract high-purity lithium from seawater.…

Skoltech researchers unveil complex defect structure of Li-ion cathode material

Skoltech scientists have studied the hydroxyl defects in LiFePO4, a widely used cathode material in commercial lithium-ion batteries, contributing to the overall understanding of the chemistry of this material. This work will help improve the LiFePO4 manufacturing process to avoid…

‘Floating’ microgrids: Optimizing naval ships’ power systems

Lehigh University electrical and computer engineering researcher Wenxin Liu awarded two ONR grants–totaling $900,000–for algorithmic design and hardware experimentation that could lead to advances in civilian microgrid technology

Cheap alloy rivals expensive platinum to boost fuel cells

As the cleanest renewable energy, hydrogen energy has attracted special attention in the research. Yet the commercialization of traditional proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs), which consume hydrogen and produce electricity, is seriously restricted due to the chemical reaction of…

Synthetic breakthrough for controlling functional group assembly over chaotic mixing

The multifunctional porous solids with diverse functionalized linkers have been utilized as promising materials for various applications in energy, environmental and biomedical areas. Although their emerging properties are ascribed to varying pore types resulting from combinations of functional groups, the…

Skoltech researchers proposed an attractive cheap organic material for batteries

A new report by Skoltech scientists and their colleagues describes an organic material for the new generation of energy storage devices, which structure follows an elegant molecular design principle. It has recently been published in ACS Applied Energy Materials and…

Generating electricity from heat using the spin Seebeck device

Thermoelectric (TE) conversion offers a carbon-free power generation from geothermal, waste, body or solar heat, and shows promise to be the next-generation energy conversion technology. At the core of such TE conversion, there lies an all solid-state thermoelectric device which…

Innovating power generation where ‘a river runs through it’

Lehigh University mechanical engineering and mechanics professor Keith Moored partners on multi-institutional hydrofoil turbine project that could help generate cleaner, more cost-effective energy for cities and rural communities alike

AI-aided search for single-atom-alloy catalysts yields more than 200 promising candidates

Skoltech researchers and their colleagues from China and Germany have presented a new search algorithm for single-atom-alloy catalysts (SAACs) that found more than 200 yet unreported candidates. Their work provides a recipe for finding best SAACs for various applications. The…