Search results for "hydrogen"

In the race to design smaller handheld devices and smartphones, a key factor is decreasing the sizes of components. As the demand for thinner and lighter microelectronic devices increases, manufacturers often are limited by how oddly shaped the energy sources must become to make them conform to the smaller space. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri, have developed a method of transferring an energy source to virtually any shape.

Space is the most hostile environment that we know of. The lack of pressure would bring our bodily fluids to the boil. Oxygen, heat, food and water are not present either. Yet people live there - on the ISS, thanks to the life support systems that are installed there. For extended space missions, such as a trip to Mars, the functional capability of these technologies is also crucial. Researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have de...

A team at the HZB Institute for Solar Fuels has developed a process for providing sensitive semiconductors for solar water splitting ('artificial leaves') with an organic, transparent protective layer. The extremely thin protective layer made of carbon chains is stable, conductive, and covered with catalysing nanoparticles of metal oxides. These accelerate the splitting of water when irradiated by light.

Michael Tonks, assistant professor of mechanical and nuclear engineering, Penn State, and director, Microstructure Science and Engineering Laboratory, Penn State, is involved with three projects through the Department of Energy's Nuclear Energy University Program (NEUP).These projects are exploring new materials for nuclear fuel, which could make current LWRs safer.

Solar fuels, clean fuels from sunlight, water and CO2, form an attractive way for storing solar energy in hydrogen or hydrocarbons, for example. The efficiency of this technology still needs a 'boost'. Researcher Kasper Wenderich, MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology of the University of Twente (NL), investigated special nanoplaatjes with platinum particles on them, accelerating the chemical conversion.

Scientists at Tokyo Institute of Technology in collaboration with colleagues in Japan demonstrate the first electrochemical reaction based on hydride ions in an oxide-based solid-state cell for potential next-gen batteries. Ionic transport has been studied extensively over the years for energy devices such as fuel cells and batteries using Li+, H+, Ag+, Cu+, F–, and O2–. Yet as Genki Kobayashi and Ryoji Kanno point out in a recent rep...

Researchers at the University of Georgia have created a nanostructure that could provide a path toward using solar energy more efficiently in the production of fuel gases. Writing in the journal Catalysis Today, the scientists say nanostructures fabricated from a core of iron oxide and coated with a shell of titanium dioxide absorb more solar energy than single-layer nanostructures.

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have discovered a natural process they describe as "reverse photosynthesis," by which the energy in solar rays breaks down plant biomass rather than building it, as is the case with photosynthesis. The sunlight is collected by chlorophyll, the same molecule used in photosynthesis. Combined with a specific enzyme, the energy of sunlight breaks down plant biomass, with possible applications in chemicals, ...

As electronics grow ever more intricate, so must the tools required to fix them. Anticipating this challenge, scientists turned to the body's immune system for inspiration and have now built self-propelled nanomotors that can seek out and repair tiny scratches to electronic systems. They could one day lead to flexible batteries, electrodes, solar cells and other gadgets that heal themselves.

Researchers at Tohoku University have discovered a new plasma wave phenomenon, leading to the development of a negative ion source for fusion plasma heating. Led by Associate Prof K. Takahashi and Prof A. Ando, the team demonstrated adjoining generations of high and low electron temperature plasmas, based on the presently discovered plasma wave physics.