BYLINE: Greg Cunningham

Newswise — Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have uncovered a path to design superionic polymer electrolytes for solid-state batteries and other energy applications that could help ensure a future of abundant and reliable energy for the United States. The scientists demonstrated that by carefully controlling the chemical composition of a lithium salt-based polymer, they could create a material that enables superfast transport of ions in batteries and many other energy storage and conversion technologies.

“Researchers around the world are focusing on unlocking the potential of polymer electrolytes because they have a lot of advantages over the conventional liquid electrolytes,” said Catalin Gainaru, an R&D staff scientist of ORNL’s Chemical Sciences Division. “Achieving fast ion transport has always been a major challenge of polymer electrolytes, but our recent research demonstrates that this may no longer be the case.”

Batteries are made up of two electrodes — a cathode and an anode — separated by an electrolyte material. As a battery charges or discharges, ions need to have a high mobility within the electrolyte as they move back and forth between electrodes. Traditional batteries use liquid or gel electrolytes, but the demand for safer and more efficient power storage has spurred interest in solid-state batteries in which the electrolyte is solid, yielding a battery that is faster charging, safer, more compact and durable. 

The challenge of ion transport in solid-state batteries

Many solid-state concepts use ceramic electrolytes that transport ions so effectively that they are known as superionic ceramics. Unfortunately, these ceramics are prone to break due to brittleness. They are also difficult to roll into thin films and don’t adhere well to the electrodes in a battery. The ORNL researchers demonstrated how a polymeric material can achieve a similar superionic state, in which ions can move up to 10 billion times faster than their surroundings, without the shortcomings of liquids and ceramics. 

Polymers are materials formed by long molecular chains made up of small, repeating building blocks. Well-known examples include a variety of plastics, which are usually made up of repeating units containing carbon and other atoms. The ORNL polymer electrolyte contains polar segments that favor the inclusion of lithium salts and strongly enhance the mobility of ions. 

The research, which was published in Materials Today, was performed as part of the DOE Energy Frontier Research Center (EFRC) known as the Fast and Cooperative Ion Transport in Polymer-Based Materials (FaCT) Center. 

“The goal of the FaCT EFRC is to fully understand how to design novel polymers that change the paradigm of ion transport,” said Tomonori Saito, an ORNL distinguished researcher in ORNL’s Chemical Sciences Division. “We developed a very special polymer in which the segments self-organize to provide a high mobility path for the ions to move through.”

A molecular design strategy enables superionic behavior

The key development was the careful tuning of the structure of the polymer by the addition of precise amounts of molecular groups known as zwitterions. These special functional groups carry both positive and negative charges, which increases local polarity but results in a zero charge for the entire macromolecule. By using careful chemical processes, researchers were able to tailor the number of zwitterionic groups attached to the polymer backbone allowing the ions to assemble into pockets. 

In these pockets, ions interact much like conversationalists at a dinner party. At first, small pockets of diffuse conversations form, isolated throughout the material. Add more pockets, though, and the discussions eventually lose individuality and evolve into a pleasant and cohesive hum. That’s when the ions start to flow like good conversation. But add too many zwitterions, and the cohesive hum devolves into a cacophony and ion transport slows back down. 

Researchers found that the sweet spot was achieved by functionalizing around 80 percent of the units of the polymer electrolyte with zwitterionic groups. At this point, the pockets connect into channel-like structures that allow ions to hop back and forth in an orderly fashion with minimal resistance.

The research team plans to build on this promising early-stage research with additional investigations into the fundamental mechanisms that enable the superionic nature of the polymer. Modeling and simulations using ORNL supercomputing resources as well as robotic autonomous chemistry coupled with AI will help understand what drives this fascinating performance, and neutron scattering studies are planned at the Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science user facility at ORNL, to observe the interactions at the molecular level. 

While solid-state batteries are a clear application for the new electrolyte, many energy technologies also rely on effective ion transport. Flow batteries, fuel cells, grid-level energy storage and many other applications could benefit from these newly developed polymers. 

“It’s hard to predict all the technologies that could leverage this discovery,” Saito said. “Anything that needs an impermeable barrier layer, but let ions move freely across it, is a potential application.”

The research was funded by the DOE’s Office of Basic Energy Sciences as part of the FaCT EFRC.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. The Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit energy.gov/science. 

Newswise — The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory made a major contribution to a high-profile experiment seeking to discover new physics. Hosted at DOE’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), the Mu2e (muon-to-electron conversion) experiment aims to observe an extremely rare process in particle physics. The experiment is a multiyear collaboration among more than 30 institutions and 200 scientists from around the world.

An Argonne team of high energy physics scientists designed and — most recently — commissioned a crucial Mu2e subsystem called the Cosmic Ray Veto (CRV) detector. This subsystem filters out the biggest source of background noise in Mu2e. Background noise refers to signals that mimic the rare process that Mu2e seeks to detect. The commissioning tests demonstrated that the CRV detector is working properly and collecting background data.

The CRV’s development and deployment was a collaborative effort among Argonne, Fermilab, Kansas State University, University of South Alabama, University of Virginia, Northern Illinois University and University of Michigan.

“The CRV detector will enable Mu2e to more reliably and accurately detect an event expected to be vanishingly rare according to current particle physics theory,” said Yuri Oksuzian, an Argonne physicist who has played a key role in Mu2e and the CRV’s development. ​“The CRV is essential because it screens out background noise that could mimic this event. Observing even a few cases of the event would be compelling evidence of new physics.”

Searching for a muon-to-electron conversion

Since the 1970s, the dominant theory in particle physics has been the Standard Model. Widely considered a robust theory, the Standard Model describes the interactions among the fundamental particles and forces in the universe. But it leaves many big questions unanswered. For example, it cannot explain gravity or dark matter, a mysterious type of matter that cannot be observed directly.

As a result, particle physicists are searching for new theories, particles and forces beyond the Standard Model. The aim is to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the universe.

Mu2e seeks to observe a muon changing to an electron without any other particles being produced. A muon is a fundamental particle that is a heavier version of an electron. The Standard Model expects this transition to be so rare that observing it at Mu2e would be a major discovery and strong evidence of new physics.

“If Mu2e detects a muon-to-electron conversion, it would indicate that there’s a new particle or force involved in this process,” said Oksuzian. ​“The discovery would fundamentally change our understanding of how the universe works.”

Screening out cosmic-ray muons

The Mu2e apparatus directs a high-intensity beam of muons to a thin aluminum foil target. Detectors probe the target for conversion events, indicated by the presence of electrons with a precise amount of energy and momentum. Remarkably, Mu2e is expected to be 10,000 times more sensitive to conversions than previous similar experiments.

The apparatus has critical subsystems that measure background — in other words, signals that look like conversions but aren’t. A major background source is cosmic rays. These are high-energy particles from space that collide with atoms in the Earth’s atmosphere. The collisions produce showers of particles, including muons, that reach the ground.

Muons can penetrate the Mu2e apparatus and knock electrons from the aluminum foil. These free electrons can potentially have the exact energy and momentum of an electron from a conversion event. If that happens, Mu2e’s detectors will mistakenly register them as the real signal.

The CRV detector, engineered by Argonne, detects background events caused by cosmic-ray muons. It is essentially a giant cage that covers key parts of the Mu2e apparatus. It consists of 83 modules, which together weigh about 60 tons. The modules are made of thousands of plastic strips that produce light photons when muons pass through them.

Special fibers inside the strips carry the photons to sensors called silicon photomultipliers. The sensors measure the photons, indicating the exact time of the muon’s passage. If the CRV detects a cosmic muon just before an electron appears in the Mu2e apparatus, that electron is rejected from the data.

“We had to carefully design the CRV structure so that there are no gaps between the modules,” said Oksuzian. ​“The objective was to ensure that the detector would not miss any cosmic muons.”

Without the CRV, cosmic-ray muons would produce thousands of ​“fake” conversion events over Mu2e’s three-to-five-year run time. Because muon-to-electron conversions are so rare, even a small number of fake events would compromise Mu2e’s accuracy. As a result, the CRV must detect and reject 99.99% of cosmic-ray muons passing through. Argonne recently evaluated the CRV’s performance over a two-year period and found that it can meet this strict design requirement.

Commissioning the CRV at Mu2e

Recently, the Argonne team transported the CRV components to the Mu2e building at Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois, and commissioned them to detect cosmic-ray muons. The successful test enabled the CRV to fulfill a key DOE technical milestone and performance objective, helping to advance Mu2e’s commissioning. Other Mu2e subsystems will be commissioned and tested over the next year.

The experiment is expected to begin in 2027. Argonne scientists will have important roles in Mu2e operations, including the CRV, data acquisition system and analysis of datasets.

Besides Oksuzian, Argonne’s CRV team also includes Simon Corrodi, Sam Grant, Peter Winter and Lei Xia.

DOE’s Office of Science is a key supporter of Mu2e and Argonne’s CRV research and oversees Mu2e’s implementation.

Argonne National Laboratory seeks solutions to pressing national problems in science and technology by conducting leading-edge basic and applied research in virtually every scientific discipline. Argonne is managed by UChicago Argonne, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, visit https://​ener​gy​.gov/​s​c​ience.

Newswise — In a study published in Bioresource Technology Journal, scientists from the universities of Portsmouth and Manchester report that a specially engineered enzyme can significantly speed up the breakdown of PET – the plastic used in water bottles, food packaging and polyester clothing – when it is processed at high concentrations similar to those used in industry. 

PET, short for poly (ethylene terephthalate), is cheap, durable, and widely used. But those same qualities mean it builds up in vast quantities once thrown away. 

Polyester textiles are notoriously difficult to recycle. Their fibres are tightly packed and highly ordered into a structure created during manufacturing, which makes them resistant to biological breakdown. 

Enzymes are natural proteins that can speed up chemical reactions. The team combined two different components into one fusion enzyme. The first was a heat-tolerant cutinase; a natural enzyme that normally breaks down a protective polyester found on plant surfaces called cutin. The second was a binding module designed to help the enzyme to attach more tightly to plastic. 

The two components were carefully matched, so they work best at the same temperature and are suited to the same kinds of plastic structure. The aim was to make the enzyme stick to PET and ensure it could continue breaking it down efficiently under realistic recycling conditions. 

While the modified enzyme did attach more strongly to highly crystalline PET – the tough, tightly packed form found in many plastics – did not automatically lead to faster breakdown. In fact, when the plastic structure remained highly ordered, there was limited gain. 

The real progress came when the plastic was less crystalline and as a result more accessible to the enzyme. Under controlled conditions that mimic industrial recycling – including carefully managed pH and plastic concentrations of 20 per cent by weight – the fused enzyme broke down less-ordered PET much more quickly. 

The biggest improvement was seen in a pre-consumer polyester textile that had been specially treated to make it less crystalline and finely ground. In that case, the amount of useful breakdown products doubled. 

“By matching the enzyme with the right binding module and preparing the plastic in the right way, we can overcome a major bottleneck in plastic recycling,” said Professor Andrew Pickford, Director of the University of Portsmouth’s Centre for Enzyme Innovation (CEI). “This isn’t just about helping the enzyme stick to the surface – it’s about making sure the chemical reaction can run efficiently at the high plastic concentrations used in industry.” 

The findings also help explain why earlier studies of similar enzyme combinations have produced mixed results. If an enzyme binds too tightly to the surface, it can slow the reaction – a well-established concept in chemistry known as the Sabatier principle. 

The study suggests that enzyme-based recycling of PET – a promising but technically challenging solution – could become more practical at scale but success, depends on getting three factors right: the enzyme, any helper module that guides it to the plastic, and the structure of the material itself. 

BYLINE: Tina M. Johnson

Newswise — Gevo, an advanced biofuels company based in Colorado, has licensed two patented catalyst technologies from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) for use in the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

“This partnership will streamline the transition of ORNL’s catalyst technologies from lab scale to pilot-scale reactors,” said Andrew Sutton, senior scientist in the Manufacturing Science Division at ORNL. “By demonstrating industrial viability, our goal is to accelerate the commercialization of this technology in the U.S., boosting global competitiveness and domestic production of aviation fuel.”

SAF is an alternative fuel made from plant- or waste-based feedstocks. The International Air Transport Association, representing more than 80% of global air traffic, is interested in SAF. Many air carriers have agreed to buy the fuel at scale, but production efficiencies remain an issue.

To meet the challenge, researchers at ORNL developed catalysts that enable a single-step conversion of ethanol to olefins (ETO), which can then be used to produce SAF. A catalyst accelerates chemical reactions and enhances the efficiency of the fuel production process.

In addition to SAF, olefins serve as key building blocks for a wide range of products, including plastics, solvents and surfactants. The global plastics market is poised for continued growth, with forecasts predicting a market worth more than $1.3 trillion by 2033.

Ethanol, commonly derived from agricultural or cellulosic feedstocks, often serves as the basis for SAF production through its conversion to olefins — key intermediates that simplify and reduce the cost of large-scale fuel manufacturing. Building on this foundation, ORNL’s novel conversion process not only achieves high carbon efficiency but does so at equal or lower cost compared with conventional methods.

Through the DOE Technology Commercialization Fund, the partnership was awarded support for a three-year cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) to advance this technology for pilot-scale operation and industrial commercialization. Gevo will guide the overall process model and provide industry know-how for successful implementation in the company’s pilot reactor.

“Gevo’s collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory focuses on evaluating a novel catalytic process that converts ethanol into valuable fuel precursors and alternative chemicals like butadiene,” said Andrew Ingram, Gevo’s director of process chemistry and catalysis. “This work complements our broader ethanol conversion portfolio but is distinct from both our commercial deployment of Axens’ alcohol-to-jet process and our next-generation ETO platform. If the economics prove out, this pathway could provide a flexible, cost-effective option to scale U.S. bio-based solutions, driven by American innovation that creates new markets and demand for farmers producing feedstocks for energy and materials.”

ORNL provides extensive scale-up expertise, employing advanced characterization capabilities at the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, which was used to provide deeper insight into catalytic processes in larger chemical reactors.

Under the CRADA, ORNL will develop catalyst pellets and test their performance in an advanced chemical reactor. Researchers will develop a computational model based on the testing data generated that can accurately predict how the process will behave at scale to clear the way for industrial use. 

Global demand for jet fuel is expected to increase from 106 billion gallons in 2019 to 230 billion gallons by 2050. Expanding SAF use could help the aviation industry meet this demand while advancing U.S. energy independence and security.

This project was supported by DOE’s Alternative Fuels and Feedstocks Office, formerly known as the Bioenergy Technologies Office, through the Chemical Catalysis for Bioenergy (ChemCatBio), a multi-laboratory consortium focused on accelerating the development of catalytic technologies that convert biomass and waste resources into bio-based fuels and chemicals. Initial program funding was provided by ORNL Laboratory Directed Research and Development and Technology Innovation programs.

In addition to Sutton, Stephen Purdy, Meijun Li, Michael Cordon and Hunter Jacobs are currently contributing to the CRADA project. Inventors of the patented technologies include ORNL’s Li and Brian Davison, former ORNL researcher Zhenglong Li and the University of Maryland’s Junyan Zhang. Jennifer Caldwell within Technology Transfer at ORNL negotiated the terms of the licensing agreement. Browse available chemical technologies for licensing.

UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE’s Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. The Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit https://energy.gov/science. — Tina M. Johnson

The research could help develop methods for reducing intense noise that threatens aircraft and ground crews

Newswise — Researchers from the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering and the Florida Center for Advanced Aero-Propulsion, or FCAAP, are helping to solve a safety challenge in military aviation: the extreme noise generated by supersonic jets during takeoff and landing.

The research, published in the Journal of Fluid Mechanics, demonstrates a new model for understanding how supersonic jets of air collide with the ground or other structures to create a resonant feedback loop that produces extreme noise that can reach dangerous volume levels.

The team examined jets like those found in a type of aircraft known as Short Takeoff and Vertical Landing jets, or STOVL. The ability to operate without a traditional runway gives these aircraft, such as the F-35B Lightning II, critical tactical advantages.

But as they descend toward the ground, their exhaust plumes interact with landing surfaces and generate intense noise, often exceeding 140 decibels, posing serious dangers to both aircraft structure and nearby personnel.

“Only a tiny fraction of the jet’s energy is transformed into sound, but this small fraction has a major impact,” said Farrukh S. Alvi, professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and former founding director of the Institute for Strategic Partnerships, Innovation, Research, and Education, or InSPIRE, and founding director of FCAAP. “The intense noise produced by jet engines can cause structural damage to the aircraft and damage the hearing of personnel on the ground. We are trying to understand the physics behind these supersonic jets and the noise they produce so that we can develop tools that can reduce their impacts. In fact, we have already had some success in developing techniques that can reduce jet noise.”

Why it matters

When the high-speed air coming from jet engines mixes with the ambient air, it creates large-scale disturbances that hit the ground, producing strong sound waves that propagate back toward the jet engine. This establishes a repeating, back‑and‑forth interaction and creates resonance, an example of a feedback loop, causing loud and repeating noise. For aircraft, these resonant vibrations accelerate structural fatigue and can generate hazardous low-pressure zones that can pull the aircraft toward the ground.

For crewmembers on the ground, sustained exposure to sound levels over 140 decibels can cause permanent hearing damage, even when wearing protective equipment. At peak intensities, extreme acoustic pressure can even cause organ damage.

An animation showing an aircraft using supersonic jets for a vertical landing. As it descends toward the ground, exhaust plumes interact with landing surfaces to generate intense noise, often exceeding 140 decibels, posing serious dangers to both aircraft structure and nearby personnel. (Courtesy of Myungjun Song)

A new approach to modeling jet resonance

The research team tested a supersonic, Mach 1.5 jet — 1.5 times the speed of sound — and adjusted nozzle pressure and the jet’s distance from the ground to simulate take-off/landing and make a range of measurements.

To see the airflow, they used a high‑speed camera and a specialized visualization technique called schlieren imaging that allowed them to ‘see’ the jet flow — including its large-scale disturbances and the sound waves generated in real time. At the same time, a highly sensitive microphone also recorded the sound produced by the jet.

When the jet is loud, the jet flow and the sound waves repeat at a regular rhythm, which is a characteristic of a resonant cycle. By matching images to a specific point in the cycle, the researchers developed a clear picture of the airflow and measured how fast large-scale disturbances in air moved and how sound waves traveled back toward the nozzle.

The researchers found that for many cases, the pitch — how the human brain perceives the frequency of sound waves — of the noise was primarily governed by acoustic standing waves, which appear stationary in space between the body of the plane and the ground. The findings reveal that the pitch is not primarily governed by disturbance velocity, thereby offering another perspective on the existing understanding of the resonance feedback. They also found that slower disturbances tend to be larger, consequently creating louder noise.

“That was surprising,” said postdoctoral researcher Myungjun Song, the study’s lead author. “We found that these acoustic standing waves are much more important in determining the pitch, while the size and speed of the disturbances decide the level or ‘loudness’ of the noise produced.”

The discovery offered the research team an insight. Because the disturbance speed has little effect on pitch, information about acoustic standing waves would be enough to predict the noise pitch.

The new model enables engineers to predict noise frequencies more easily during aircraft and landing pad design, a critical step toward protecting both aircraft structures and personnel from acoustic trauma.

World-class research facilities drive discovery

The experiments were conducted at FCAAP’s specialized research facilities, designed for advanced high-speed aerodynamic studies at the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering.

Researchers used the FCAAP’s STOVL facility, which offers cutting-edge flow diagnostic capabilities, and the hot jet facility, which can generate high-temperature, high-speed airflow in an anechoic chamber to allow for highly accurate acoustic measurements under realistic jet conditions.

“While jet propulsion is an important focus of our work, our research is not limited to it,” Alvi said. “The university and the college, through FCAAP, operates a polysonic wind tunnel that simulates supersonic flows up to Mach 6 — supersonic to hypersonic conditions. We also use our anechoic wind tunnel and subsonic wind tunnels for numerous other aerospace related research projects. Together, these facilities and the expertise of our researchers create a one-of-a-kind ecosystem for conducting leading-edge research in aerospace and aviation.”

An associated initiative, InSPIRE is an FSU-led effort to establish a new aerospace and advanced manufacturing hub in Bay County, Florida. The program builds on FCAAP’s foundation to develop complementary facilities for larger hypersonic wind tunnels that can handle a wider range of conditions for applied, industry-relevant research.

“In partnership with industry, InSPIRE is also integrating advanced manufacturing capabilities that will allow much more efficient test and evaluation and assist our industry partners to innovate manufacturing processes in a realistic factory-modeled setting,” said Alvi, the former director of InSPIRE. “Working with industry partners allows our researchers to use their expertise to solve the pressing and difficult problems that are directly relevant for industry.”

Research team and support

The project was a collaborative effort involving Song, the study’s lead author; Alvi; and graduate student Serdar Seçkin.

Funding was provided by the Office of Naval Research, with additional support from the National Science Foundation, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, FCAAP, the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering and the Don Fuqua Eminent Scholar Fund.

Newswise — Scientists discovered how tiny changes in superhydride structure enable superconductivity at near room temperatures but extreme pressure — offering clues for designing more practical superconductors.

Superconductors allow electricity to flow without resistance, meaning no energy is lost as heat. This property makes them useful for technologies such as MRI scanners, particle accelerators, magnetic-levitation trains and some power-transmission systems. Most superconductors, however, only work at extremely low temperatures — often hundreds of degrees below zero Fahrenheit. Keeping materials that cold requires complex and costly cooling systems, which limits where the superconductors can be used.

Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have helped take a step toward easing that limitation. They have gained new insight into a class of materials called superhydrides that can become superconducting at much higher temperatures — around 10 degrees Fahrenheit.

The research was carried out with collaborators from the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), the University of Chicago and DOE’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. A key tool was the upgraded Advanced Photon Source (APS), a DOE Office of Science user facility at Argonne.

“These experiments show what the upgraded APS can do. We can now study atomic-level structures with unprecedented detail in materials under extreme pressure.” — Maddury Somayazulu, Argonne physicist

Superhydrides are made mostly of hydrogen, held together in an ordered structure (crystal) by a small number of metal atoms. When subjected to extremely high pressures, these materials can carry electric current with no resistance. In a landmark 2018 study, researchers led by UIC professor Russell Hemley showed that a lanthanum-based superhydride could superconduct near 8 degrees Fahrenheit. The drawback was that it only worked at pressures equivalent to those deep within the Earth (1.88 million atmospheres), making it impractical outside the lab.

In the new study, Hemley and his fellow researchers explored whether changing the material’s chemistry could lower the pressure needed for superconductivity. They added a small amount of yttrium to the lanthanum superhydride to make it more stable and reduce the pressure required.

“To reach these extreme pressures, we squeezed a tiny sample between two diamonds,” said Maddury Somayazulu, a physicist at the APS. The team’s diamond-anvil device can generate pressures as high as five million atmospheres.

After forming the superconducting material at high pressure and temperature, the team used high-energy X-rays from the APS to study its structure (at beamlines 16-ID-B and 13-ID-D). ​“We focused an intense X-ray beam onto a sample only a few micrometers thick and about ten to twenty micrometers across,” said Vitali Prakapenka, a beamline scientist and research professor at the University of Chicago. One micrometer is about 1/70^th the width of a human hair.

The recent APS upgrade made these measurements possible. Its brighter, more tightly focused X-ray beam allowed researchers to study extremely small samples while changing the pressure. ​“That beam allowed us to separate signals coming from the tiny sample itself as opposed to those coming from the surrounding materials and diamond anvils,” Prakapenka said.

The team found that small differences in how atoms are arranged in a crystalline lattice can strongly affect superconductivity. They identified two different crystal structures, each becoming superconducting at a slightly different temperature.

“These experiments show what the upgraded APS can do,” Somayazulu said. ​“We can now study atomic-level structures with unprecedented detail in materials under extreme pressure.”

Although the pressures used in the experiments are still very high — about 1.4 million times atmospheric pressure — the researchers see this as part of a longer path forward. They are adding more elements to lower the pressure further with the goal of making these materials practical.

Diamonds provide a useful comparison, Somayazulu explained. Natural diamonds form deep inside the Earth under extreme pressure and temperature. Scientists later learned how to synthesize them in the lab, and eventually how to produce them without such intense conditions. Researchers believe superhydrides could follow a similar path.

“If we understand the physics well enough, we may be able to stabilize these structures at much lower pressures but still attain superconductivity close to room temperature,” Prakapenka said.

Experimental data from the APS will help guide theoretical models and AI tools in that search for new materials. Instead of testing only a few combinations at quite-challenging-to-reach extreme conditions, scientists can use AI to explore many possible multi-element compositions. They can then focus experiments on the most promising ones.

“The calculations are very demanding,” Prakapenka said. ​“Theorists rely on high-quality experimental data to make their predictions more accurate.”

Finding a material that superconducts at near room temperature and normal pressure could reshape the nation’s electrical infrastructure.

The research was supported by the DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences, DOE National Nuclear Security Administration and the National Science Foundation. Contributors include Maddury Somayazulu, Russell Hemley, Vitali Prakapenka, Abdul Haseeb Manayil-Marathamkottil, Kui Wang, Nilesh Salke, Muhtar Ahart, Alexander Mark, Rostislav Hrubiak, Stella Chariton, Dean Smith and Nenad Velisavljevic.

This article was adapted from the UIC release.

About the Advanced Photon Source

The U. S. Department of Energy Office of Science’s Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Laboratory is one of the world’s most productive X-ray light source facilities. The APS provides high-brightness X-ray beams to a diverse community of researchers in materials science, chemistry, condensed matter physics, the life and environmental sciences, and applied research. These X-rays are ideally suited for explorations of materials and biological structures; elemental distribution; chemical, magnetic, electronic states; and a wide range of technologically important engineering systems from batteries to fuel injector sprays, all of which are the foundations of our nation’s economic, technological, and physical well-being. Each year, more than 5,000 researchers use the APS to produce over 2,000 publications detailing impactful discoveries, and solve more vital biological protein structures than users of any other X-ray light source research facility. APS scientists and engineers innovate technology that is at the heart of advancing accelerator and light-source operations. This includes the insertion devices that produce extreme-brightness X-rays prized by researchers, lenses that focus the X-rays down to a few nanometers, instrumentation that maximizes the way the X-rays interact with samples being studied, and software that gathers and manages the massive quantity of data resulting from discovery research at the APS.

This research used resources of the Advanced Photon Source, a U.S. DOE Office of Science User Facility operated for the DOE Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357.

Argonne National Laboratory seeks solutions to pressing national problems in science and technology by conducting leading-edge basic and applied research in virtually every scientific discipline. Argonne is managed by UChicago Argonne, LLC for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, visit https://​ener​gy​.gov/​s​c​ience.

Catalytic treatment of industrial pollutants has long faced a practical bottleneck. Noble metal nanoparticles are highly active, but they often tend to aggregate, reducing the number of active usable reaction sites. Traditional methods for producing polymer-supported catalysts can also be slow, multistep, and dependent on toxic reagents, surfactants, or poorly controlled batch conditions. Meanwhile, 4-nitrophenol remains a hazardous pollutant commonly found in industrial wastewater, and existing catalytic systems often suffer from limited surface area, uneven active-species distribution, and inefficient mass transfer. Based on these challenges, in-depth research is needed on controllable catalyst supports and continuous-flow catalytic platforms.

In a study published (DOI: 10.1038/s41378-026-01176-6) in 2026 in Microsystems & Nanoengineering, Li Ma and colleagues from Xi’an Jiaotong University and collaborating institutions reported a spiral-microchannel platform for continuously producing morphology-tailored polystyrene microspheres loaded with Ag, Ag-Au, or Ag-Pt nanoparticles. Corresponding author Nanjing Hao and the team showed that tuning the structure of the polymer carrier could directly improve catalytic behavior in the reduction of 4-nitrophenol.

The researchers began with uniform solid polystyrene seeds averaging 1.48 μm in diameter, then used water-ethanol and water-toluene systems to drive them into hollow, dimpled, bowl-like, and open-hole forms. In one striking transformation, unsymmetrical dimples evolved into open-hole structures within 5 minutes after introducing a small amount of toluene. These evolving microspheres were then passed through a spiral microreactor, where rapid microscale mixing enabled metal precursors to form and anchor onto the polymer surface in minutes rather than hours. Hollow and open-hole structures provided larger surface areas and confined microenvironments, helping load more nanoparticles and improve mass transfer. The system produced evenly distributed Ag, Ag-Pt, and Ag-Au nanoparticles, while also reducing aggregation. Among all tested catalysts, open-hole Ag-Pt microspheres performed best, reaching a reaction rate constant of 1.73 × 10^^-2 s^{^-1} and an activity parameter of 692 s^^-1·g^^-1, while maintaining catalytic activity over five reuse cycles.

The study suggests that catalyst performance can be engineered not only by changing the metal itself, but also by reshaping the support beneath it. By controlling carrier morphology, the team was able to regulate nanoparticle immobilization, improve accessibility of active sites, and strengthen confined synergistic catalysis. In this sense, the microreactor becomes more than a synthesis tool: it becomes a way to manufacture catalytic function with precision.

The implications go beyond a single wastewater reaction. A scalable continuous-flow strategy for robust bimetallic catalysts could be valuable in environmental remediation, fine chemical synthesis, and other industrial processes where fast mixing, stable active sites, and reusable catalytic materials are essential. Just as importantly, the study turns a toxic pollutant into a useful product, pointing toward a broader model of greener chemistry in which waste treatment and value creation can happen together.

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References

DOI

10.1038/s41378-026-01176-6

Original Source URL

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41378-026-01176-6

Funding information

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2023YFC3904301), the Key R&D Program of Shaanxi Province (2024GX-YBXM-471), the Qin Chuang Yuan Talent Program (2021QCYRC4-33), and the Distinguished Overseas Young Scholars of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (GYKP032).

About Microsystems & Nanoengineering

Microsystems & Nanoengineering is an online-only, open access international journal devoted to publishing original research results and reviews on all aspects of Micro and Nano Electro Mechanical Systems from fundamental to applied research. The journal is published by Springer Nature in partnership with the Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, supported by the State Key Laboratory of Transducer Technology.

Newswise — Marine mud is generated in large quantities during dredging, coastal development, land reclamation, and marine construction. In fast-growing urban regions, this sediment can become a major waste-management burden because it is wet, sticky, difficult to handle, and often contaminated with heavy metals. Conventional stabilization methods usually rely heavily on Portland cement, which is effective but energy-intensive and carbon-heavy. Alternative geopolymer approaches are promising, yet many still depend on corrosive or costly activators and do not always immobilize contaminants well enough. Based on these challenges, there is a pressing need to carry out in-depth research on low-carbon, practical, and safe strategies for the remediation and in-situ reuse of contaminated marine mud.

A team from Harbin Institute of Technology, Tsinghua University Shenzhen International Graduate School, the University of Abomey-Calavi, and the Beninese Office for Geological and Mining Research reported (DOI: 10.1007/s11783-026-2122-z) online on January 10, 2026, in  ENGINEERING Environment that contaminated marine mud can be remediated and recycled in situ into engineered backfill materials using low-carbon formulations built around aluminosilicate raw materials.

To build a treatment route that was both effective and realistic, the researchers designed the work in stages. They collected marine mud from a construction site in Macao, then tested blends containing Portland cement, fly ash, slag, river sand, water, and low-concentration NaOH. The goal was not simply to harden the mud, but to find a mix that could improve strength, suppress heavy-metal release, and remain practical for large-scale site use. After preparing and curing the samples, the team evaluated compressive strength, unconfined compressive strength, leaching toxicity, and microstructural characteristics through XRF, XRD, SEM, and TEM analyses. The strongest optimized mixtures achieved unconfined compressive strengths (UCS) values of 7.75 MPa with 25% OPC, 4.24 MPa with fly ash, 8.69 MPa with slag, and 3.15 MPa with a river-sand formulation—each above the 1 MPa benchmark for backfill application. At the same time, the treatment sharply reduced the leaching of As, Ba, Cd, Cr, and Pb, with Pb completely removed in all mixtures. XRD and morphological analyses further showed that the stabilized mud developed mineral and gel phases dominated by SiO₂, Ca(CO₃), Mn_1.7Fe₁.₃O₄, and complex silicate structures, which helped explain the improved strength and contaminant immobilization.

“This work shows that contaminated marine mud does not have to remain an environmental liability,” the study suggests in essence. By replacing more carbon-intensive treatment approaches with lower-carbon mineral formulations, the research reframes marine sediment as a reusable resource rather than a disposal problem. Just as importantly, the team designed the system with real construction conditions in mind, including the use of locally available river sand and simplified activation chemistry. That practical orientation makes the study especially valuable for coastal cities facing both land scarcity and mounting waste-treatment costs.

The implications extend beyond one sediment stream. This research offers a route toward cleaner coastal engineering, lower landfill dependence, and more circular use of waste materials in infrastructure projects. For regions where marine mud accounts for a large share of construction waste, in-situ recycling could ease pressure on disposal sites while cutting transport and treatment expenses. The study also aligns with wider carbon-reduction goals by reducing reliance on traditional cement-heavy stabilization. In the longer term, such low-carbon remediation systems could help cities manage contaminated sediments more safely while turning them into useful materials for backfilling, site restoration, and future sustainable construction applications.

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References

DOI

10.1007/s11783-026-2122-z

Original Source URL

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-026-2122-z

Funding Information

This work was supported by Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation, China (No. 2022B1515130006). Acknowledgements are also given to Shenzhen Science and Technology Program: Sustainable Development Special Project (No.KCXST20221021111408021) and International Collaboration Project (No. GJHZ20220913143007013).

About  ENGINEERING Environment 

ENGINEERING Environment  is an international journal in environmental disciplines, jointly sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Tsinghua University, and Higher Education Press. The journal is dedicated to advancing and disseminating the discoveries of cutting-edge theories, innovations in engineering technology, and practices in technological application within the environmental discipline. Adhering to the principle of integrating scientific theories with engineering technologies, the journal emphasizes the convergence of environmental protection with One Health, climate change response, and sustainable development. It places particular emphasis on the forward-looking nature of novel technologies and emerging challenges, the practicality of solutions, and interdisciplinary innovations.

Newswise — Labeled glass containers full of liquids stirred by spinning magnets are connected to humming machines with neatly organized tubes. Here in this lab space at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), scientists are pioneering ways to extract critical materials from recycled waste products.

Critical materials are essential to modern life because they possess properties that make them difficult to replace. They’re used in smartphones, satellites, computer chips, rechargeable batteries, fighter jets, advanced weapons systems and other technologies. But they can be hard to find; that’s where INL’s research comes in.

The national challenge

The U.S. has deposits of nearly all critical materials, but mining capabilities cannot meet the nation’s growing demand. Most extraction and processing are done overseas, much of it in China. This reliance on foreign critical materials risks supply disruptions that could affect U.S. national security, economic growth and everyday life. After mining, rocks are crushed and processed to separate valuable materials from waste. This step, called beneficiation, prepares the material for further refining. These materials are then concentrated for easier transport and treated with heat or chemicals to fully extract and purify them. However, modern processing isn’t always sufficient and often produces significant waste.

In copper mines, for example, the ore contains up to 0.2% copper, meaning about 99.8% of the rock is discarded. That waste still contains other metals and critical materials, but most processing facilities are only designed to extract one or two materials.

The critical materials in discarded rocks, e-waste and other sources don’t degrade over time and can be recovered. However, the U.S. lacks the infrastructure to recycle them.

Recycling facilities could tap into these largely untouched sources, helping meet U.S. demand. These facilities could be built far more quickly than new mines, which can take over a decade due to permitting, costs and infrastructure needs.

“The U.S. doesn’t recycle well,” said Bob Fox, a senior manager at INL. “There’s a willingness to recover critical materials from recycled sources, but there’s no infrastructure or market for it. Right now, critical materials recycling doesn’t have the economic incentives to drive infrastructure development.”

INL is working to change that by making recycling more efficient, less energy-intensive and economically viable.

“Recycling represents a crucial pathway for the U.S. to obtain critical materials, including rare earth elements like dysprosium,” said Arindam Mukhopadhyay, a staff scientist at INL. “Even critical materials we mine domestically, such as lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese, can be recovered through recycling.”

INL’s recycling research

Since the early 2010s, INL has developed technologies that reduce chemical use, energy consumption and waste, making recycling more sustainable and cost-effective. These innovations improve recovery from sources such as electronic and agricultural waste, mine tailings and industrial wastewater.

“INL has developed a comprehensive portfolio of critical materials recycling technologies,” said Mukhopadhyay. “We have the expertise and proven processes to help make recycling economically competitive, which is essential for building a reliable domestic supply of the materials our nation depends on.”

One area INL has worked in for many years is biohydrometallurgy, which uses biological systems to dissolve and recover metals. INL’s research examines how microbial populations fed agricultural or municipal waste biomass produce organic acids that break down metals in both metallic and mineral forms. These biologically produced acids dissolve the material and release valuable metals such as rare earth elements, cobalt and lithium. The dissolved metals can then be recovered from the liquid using natural biology-based molecules instead of man-made chemicals. INL’s work is improving the efficiency, effectiveness and affordability of biohydrometallurgy and offers a promising, cost-effective alternative to harsh chemical reagents.

Ether-based Aqueous Separation and Extraction (EASE) uses water-soluble, ether-based chemicals that pull specific materials from mixtures to recover critical materials from industrial wastewater, desalination brines, mine runoff and geothermal fluids. This process uses less energy and fewer chemicals than conventional extraction methods and produces less waste.

Another area of innovation is INL’s electrochemistry work. Electrochemistry uses electricity to trigger chemical reactions that separate and recover critical materials from waste.

Electrons are easier and less expensive to generate than the chemicals required for traditional extraction methods. Electrochemistry can reduce the use of chemicals, some of which can be toxic, by 88% to 90%, and the process uses up to 75% less energy.

Electrochemical Leach (EC-Leach)

EC-Leach uses electricity to cause chemical reactions in liquids to extract critical materials like lithium, cobalt, nickel and manganese. The process was originally developed to extract critical materials from used lithium-ion batteries, but INL is adapting it for mining applications.

Pilot systems show EC-Leach can recover more than 95% of these critical materials. INL researchers are working to scale this technology for commercial deployment.

Electrochemical Recycling of Electronic Constituents of Value (E-RECOV)

E-RECOV uses an electrochemical cell to recover critical materials from electronic scrap. Electrochemical cells use chemical reactions to produce electricity used in electrochemistry. E-RECOV operates at room temperature, uses up to 75% fewer chemicals than traditional processes and doesn’t produce toxic emissions.

The technology has received a TechConnect National Innovation Award and was a finalist for an R&D 100 Award. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Critical Materials Institute supports the development of TechConnect.

Free Flowing Electrophoretic System (FFES)

The FFE unit uses an electric field with tailored ligand systems (small molecules that bind to metal ions) to separate critical materials from complex mixtures into distinct, isolated streams. The device can be moved closer to, or into, mines to separate critical materials from metal-rich liquids.

Electrochemical Membrane Reactor

Researchers at INL developed an electrochemical membrane reactor that removes contaminants from spent lithium-ion battery leachates, the mineral-rich liquids produced during recycling. The reactor recovers more than 95% of valuable metals such as nickel and cobalt using only water, air and electricity. It also produces acid that can be reused in the extraction process. The system has the potential to serve as a cost-effective closed-loop solution for recycling critical materials from batteries.

Improving purity

Most modern applications need critical materials to be at 99.999% purity or higher, but most conventional separation processing can only achieve 85% to 95% purity unless the process is run over weeks or months. INL’s electrochemical work can achieve 99.9999% purity in fewer cycles, dramatically reducing processing time and costs.

Rare Earth Element-Metal (RE-Metal)

RE-Metal is a process that recovers rare earth elements from waste materials using electricity. First, the elements are dissolved using nontoxic solutions. Then an electric current is applied to turn the dissolved materials into solid metal on an electrode.

Other projects include generating hydrogen peroxide from air to help dissolve minerals and separating graphite, copper and arsenic while immobilizing toxic chemicals.

Real-world impact

“Our goal is to make recycling economically viable,” said Mukhopadhyay. “To do that, we’ve focused on reducing chemical use, energy consumption and waste generation while maximizing recovery rates.”

INL’s technologies offer cost-effective options to secure the domestic critical materials supply chain and meet the nation’s growing demand. By advancing recycling and recovery methods, INL helps ensure the U.S. has the materials it needs to overcome current and future challenges.

About Idaho National Laboratory

Battelle Energy Alliance manages INL for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy. INL is the nation’s center for nuclear energy research and development, and also performs research in each of DOE’s strategic goal areas: energy, national security, science and the environment. For more information, visit www.inl.gov.

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# A novel catalyst design enables simultaneous control of lattice structure and oxygen vacancies in molybdenum oxide through iron (Fe) substitution, with the study selected as a cover article in a leading international journal.

# Achieves high water electrolysis performance using low-cost, non-precious metal-based catalysts, with strong potential for applications in eco-friendly hydrogen production and the hydrogen economy.

 Newswise — CHANGWON, South Korea — Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS), led by President Chuljin Choi, announced that a research team led by Dr. Dahee Park at the Hydrogen Energy Materials Research Center has successfully developed a high-performance catalyst that significantly enhances the oxygen evolution reaction (OER), a key process in alkaline water electrolysis. The team achieved this by partially substituting molybdenum oxide (MoOx) with iron (Fe), enabling simultaneous control of lattice structure and oxygen vacancies. The study presents a new catalyst design strategy that delivers performance and stability comparable to precious metal catalysts while utilizing low-cost materials.

Hydrogen is widely regarded as a clean energy source with zero carbon emissions, and water electrolysis is considered a next-generation technology for eco-friendly hydrogen production. However, the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) remains a major bottleneck due to its slow kinetics and high energy requirements, which reduce overall efficiency. Although precious metal catalysts offer high performance, their high cost and limited availability have driven the need for alternative non-precious metal catalysts. Molybdenum-based oxides have attracted attention as promising alternatives due to their ability to finely tune electronic properties. However, their relatively low electrical conductivity and limited number of active sites have restricted their practical performance.

To address these challenges, the KIMS research team introduced a novel design approach by incorporating iron (Fe) into the MoOx structure, enabling simultaneous control of atomic arrangement and oxygen vacancies. This approach improves electron transport and increases the number of active sites where reactions occur. Using an aerosol-assisted spray pyrolysis process, the team successfully synthesized Fe-substituted MoOx catalysts through a single-step process. The formation of Fe–O–Mo heterostructures enhances structural stability, allowing the catalyst to maintain performance over extended operation.

Furthermore, by precisely controlling heat-treatment conditions, the researchers engineered lattice distortion and oxygen vacancies within the catalyst, forming unique core–shell and yolk–shell structures with internal voids. These structures increase the surface area in contact with water and improve electrical conductivity. Notably, the activation of the lattice oxygen mechanism (LOM), in which lattice oxygen directly participates in the reaction, was found to significantly enhance OER efficiency. As a result, the catalyst demonstrated outstanding performance, achieving a low overpotential of approximately 294 mV at a high current density of 100 mA/cm² and maintaining stable operation for over 100 hours.

This technology has strong potential for commercialization as a key catalyst for eco-friendly hydrogen production in the carbon-neutral era. In particular, it is expected to play a critical role in improving the efficiency of large-scale hydrogen production when applied to alkaline water electrolysis systems. By offering a viable alternative to expensive precious metal catalysts, the technology is also anticipated to reduce hydrogen production costs and contribute to the expansion of clean energy infrastructure.

“This study demonstrates a strategy to maximize catalytic performance by simultaneously controlling atomic structure and defects in low-cost metals,” said Dr. Dahee Park, the senior researcher at KIMS. “We plan to extend this catalyst design approach to various electrochemical energy conversion reactions and further develop next-generation eco-friendly energy technologies.”

The research was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea under the Ministry of Science and ICT and by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy. The findings were published online on February 12, 2026, in the international journal ChemSusChem (Impact Factor: 6.6) and selected as a cover article for its March 2026 issue.

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About Korea Institute of Materials Science(KIMS)

KIMS is a non-profit government-funded research institute under the Ministry of Science and ICT of the Republic of Korea. As the only institute specializing in comprehensive materials technologies in Korea, KIMS has contributed to Korean industry by carrying out a wide range of activities related to materials science including R&D, inspection, testing&evaluation, and technology support.