Lifeboat Foundation

A team of engineers and materials scientists at LG Chem, Korea’s largest chemical company, has developed a material that they claim could greatly reduce the risk of thermal runaway and resulting fires in batteries. In their paper published in the journal Nature Communications, the group describes how they developed the material and how well it has worked during testing.

Over the past several years, consumers have witnessed or have heard about batteries in smartphones or cars catching on fire. These fires, it has been found, result from thermal runaway, which is where the anode and cathode inside a battery come too close together, or worse, actually touch.

The result is a short, which generates heat, and results soon thereafter in a fire. In this new effort, the team at LG has developed a thin material that, when placed between the cathode and collector, prevents thermal runaway.

An international research team led by Brandeis University has achieved a major breakthrough in the field of active matter physics, as detailed in a study published this week in Physical Review X. This pioneering research offers the first experimental validation of a key theoretical prediction about 3D active nematic liquid crystals by trapping them within cell-sized spherical droplets.

In a first for Germany, researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have shown how tin vacancies in diamonds can be precisely controlled using microwaves. These vacancies have special optical and magnetic properties and can be used as qubits, the smallest computational units for quantum computing and quantum communication. The results are an important step for the development of high-performance quantum computers and secure quantum communications networks.

Researchers from Berkeley Lab’s Accelerator Technology & Applied Physics (ATAP) Division have teamed up with colleagues from Michigan State University’s Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB), the world’s most powerful heavy-ion accelerator, to develop a new superconducting magnet based on niobium-tin (Nb3Sn) technology.

A group of international researchers utilized the advanced underwater technology from MBARI to explore and record the changes in underwater landscapes in a remote Arctic region, focusing on the effects of melting permafrost and the formation of new ice.

Researchers from Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI), in collaboration with an international team, have discovered extensive underwater ice formations along the edge of the Canadian Beaufort Sea, in a remote Arctic region. This finding uncovers a previously unknown process contributing to the continued formation of submarine permafrost ice.

In a previous MBARI study, researchers observed enormous craters on the seafloor in this area, attributed to the thawing of ancient permafrost submerged underwater. While exploring the flanks of these craters on a subsequent expedition, MBARI researchers and collaborators from the Korea Polar Research Institute (KOPRI), the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources, the Geological Survey of Canada, and the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory observed exposed layers of submarine permafrost ice.

Researchers at the University of Hawaiʻi have revealed that our galaxy, part of the Laniākea supercluster, might actually reside within a significantly larger cosmic structure, potentially centered around the massive Shapley concentration.

This discovery, emerging from the study of 56,000 galaxies, suggests that our cosmic neighborhood could be 10 times larger than previously estimated, challenging existing models of the universe’s structure.

An international research team guided by astronomers at the University of Hawaiʻi Institute for Astronomy is challenging our understanding of the universe with groundbreaking findings that suggest our cosmic neighborhood may be far larger than previously thought. The Cosmicflows team has been studying the trajectories of 56,000 galaxies, revealing a potential shift in the scale of our galactic basin of attraction.

Light sources, a form of particle accelerator, produce powerful beams of X-rays and other spectrums, enabling scientists to peer into the microscopic structure of materials without physically altering them.

These machines differ from other accelerators as they use oscillating magnetic fields to generate light directly. They play a crucial role across various scientific fields, from studying atomic structures with hard X-rays to examining electronic structures with terahertz waves.

Light sources are a type of particle accelerator that produce powerful beams of X-rays, ultra-violet, or infrared light. These beams are similar to how holding an envelope in front of a bright light can reveal something about what’s inside the envelope. But by using special types of light vastly more powerful than the X-ray machine in a doctor’s office, these light sources help scientists see inside matter. It’s like seeing inside an envelope without opening it. This gives scientists the power to reveal how materials behave at microscopic or nanoscale sizes as well as at ultrafast speeds.

Utilizing the James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers have refined the measurement of the Hubble constant by studying SN H0pe, a gravitationally lensed Type Ia supernova.

This approach, integrating gravitational lensing and time-delay observations, offers a more precise determination of the universe’s expansion rate, helping reconcile some differences between past measurements.

Measuring the Hubble constant, which defines the rate at which the universe is expanding, is a dynamic field of study for astronomers globally. These researchers analyze data from both terrestrial and orbital observatories. NASAs James Webb Space Telescope has already made significant contributions to this discussion. Earlier this year, astronomers employed Webb data that included Cepheid variables and Type Ia supernovae—both reliable cosmic distance markers—to validate previous measurements of the universe’s expansion rate made by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.

A new toolkit helps monitor and improve the efficiency of superconducting radiofrequency cavities in particle accelerators by ensuring smoother inner surfaces and analyzing impurities in niobium cavities.

Superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavities are essential to the function of advanced particle accelerators. They are a key part of the systems that power the electromagnetic fields that accelerate subatomic particles. The efficiency of these cavities is influenced by the cleanliness, shape, and smoothness of their inner surfaces.

Enhancing SRF Cavities with New Toolkits.