Researchers at the University of Rochester have produced a material that is superconductive at room temperature, the holy grail of materials development that holds the potential to revolutionize virtually every aspect of modern technology—all without the need for bulky refrigeration equipment required to cool the material low enough to produceread more
One of the ways that scientists propose that we tackle the problem of global warming is to actively remove greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, from the atmosphere. To be an effective compliment to reducing our CO2 output from transport and industry, carbon sequestration will have to be done on a massive scale, meaning that the materials used in the process will need to be plentiful. One of those materials, magnesite, readily absorbs CO2, but there are both practical and economic limits keeping industry from mining the mineral in quantities large enough to be effective. However, researchers in Canada have discovered a way to quickly produce the mineral artificially.read more
Last January, France’s Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) detection stations began detecting the presence of radioactive iodine-131 in the air across Europe. While the concentrations of the radioactive substance are still well within accepted safety limits, its source remains a mystery, despite numerous investigations having been conducted into the event over the past month.
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Silicon is the second most common element in the Earth’s crust, after oxygen. However, aside from its non-organic use by certain sea sponges and microorganisms, very little silicon is used by Earth’s biology, despite making heavy use of other common elements, such as carbon, hydrogen, iron, magnesium and oxygen. This has presented a long-standing puzzle for scientists: why would nature ignore such an otherwise useful substance?
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