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A breakthrough that turns exhaust CO2 into useful materials

Exhaust gases from home furnaces, fireplaces, and industrial facilities release carbon dioxide (CO2) into the air, contributing to pollution. Scientists reporting in ACS Energy Letters have developed a new type of electrode designed to address this problem by capturing CO2 directly from the air and turning it into a useful chemical called formic acid. In testing, the system outperformed existing electrode technologies when exposed to simulated flue gas and when operating at CO2 levels similar to those found in the atmosphere.

"This work shows that carbon capture and conversion do not need to be treated as separate steps. By integrating both functions into a single electrode, we demonstrate a simpler pathway for CO2 utilization under realistic gas conditions," explains Wonyong Choi, a corresponding author on the study.

Why CO2 Conversion Has Been So Difficult

Pulling carbon dioxide out of the air may seem straightforward, especially since plants do it naturally. The greater challenge lies in transforming that captured gas into something useful, a step that is essential if carbon capture technologies are to be widely adopted. In real industrial exhaust, CO2 is usually mixed with other gases, including nitrogen and oxygen. Most existing conversion systems only work efficiently when carbon dioxide has already been separated and concentrated, which limits their practicality.

To overcome this obstacle, Donglai Pan, Myoung Hwan Oh, Wonyong Choi, and their colleagues set out to build a system that could operate under realistic conditions. Their goal was to create a device capable of handling flue gas as it is actually produced and converting even small amounts of captured CO2 into a valuable product.

Inside the Three Layer Electrode

The research team designed an electrode that allows gas to pass through it, trap carbon dioxide, and convert it at the same time. The device is made up of three layers: a material that captures CO2, a sheet of gas permeable carbon paper, and a catalytic layer of tin(IV) oxide. Together, these components enable the direct conversion of carbon dioxide gas into formic acid.

Formic acid is an important chemical used in a range of applications, including fuel cells and other industrial processes. Producing it directly from exhaust gases could make carbon reuse more practical and cost effective.

Strong Results Under Real World Conditions

When tested with pure CO2 gas, the new electrode showed about 40% higher efficiency than existing carbon conversion electrodes under similar laboratory conditions. The advantage became even clearer when researchers used a simulated flue gas containing 15% CO2, 8% oxygen gas, and 77% nitrogen gas. Under these conditions, the new system continued to generate substantial amounts of formic acid, while other technologies produced very little.

The electrode also proved capable of capturing carbon dioxide at concentrations similar to those found in the atmosphere, showing that it can function in ambient air. According to the researchers, this approach offers a promising path toward integrating carbon capture into real industrial applications. They also suggest that similar designs could eventually be adapted to capture and convert other greenhouse gases, including methane.

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Scientists Found a Platinum Alternative Hiding in Plain Sight

A low-cost industrial metal just proved it can beat platinum at recycling plastic and powering cleaner chemistry.

Many products people use every day, from plastics to detergents, depend on chemical reactions powered by catalysts made from precious metals such as platinum. While platinum is highly effective, it is also expensive and limited in supply. Scientists have spent years searching for alternatives that are both affordable and sustainable. One strong candidate is tungsten carbide, an Earth-abundant material already widely used in industrial machinery, cutting tools, and chisels.

Despite its promise, tungsten carbide has not been easy to apply in chemical manufacturing. Its unique properties have limited its effectiveness in the past. Recent research led by Marc Porosoff, an associate professor in the University of Rochester’s Department of Chemical and Sustainability Engineering, has now addressed several of these challenges, bringing tungsten carbide closer to serving as a realistic substitute for platinum.

Why Atomic Arrangement Matters

According to Sinhara Perera, a chemical engineering PhD student in Porosoff’s lab, one of the main obstacles lies in the way tungsten carbide atoms are arranged.

Part of what makes tungsten carbide difficult to use as a catalyst, she explains, is that its atoms can organize themselves into many different configurations, known as phases.

“There’s been no clear understanding of the surface structure of tungsten carbide because it’s really difficult to measure the catalytic surface inside the chambers where these chemical reactions take place,” says Perera.

To overcome this limitation, the research team developed a way to control the material’s structure while reactions were actively occurring. In a study published in ACS Catalysis, Porosoff, Perera, and chemical engineering undergraduate student Eva Ciuffetelli ’27 carefully engineered tungsten carbide particles at the nanoscale inside a chemical reactor, where temperatures can exceed 700 degrees Celsius.

Using a method called temperature-programmed carburization, they created tungsten carbide catalysts in specific phases directly inside the reactor. The researchers then carried out chemical reactions and analyzed which versions delivered the best performance.

“Some of the phases are more thermodynamically stable, so that’s where the catalyst inherently wants to end up,” says Porosoff. “But other phases that are less thermodynamically stable are more effective as catalysts.”

Through this process, the team identified a specific phase, β-W2C, that performed especially well in reactions that convert carbon dioxide into essential building blocks for fuels and other valuable chemicals. With further optimization by industry, Porosoff and his colleagues believe this phase could rival platinum while avoiding its high cost and limited availability.

Using Tungsten Carbide to Upcycle Plastic Waste

The researchers also examined how tungsten carbide could help address another major challenge: plastic waste. Porosoff and his collaborators studied its use as a catalyst for plastic upcycling, a process that transforms discarded plastics into higher-quality materials.

In a study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, led by Linxao Chen from the University of North Texas and supported by Porosoff and University of Rochester Assistant Professor Siddharth Deshpande, the team demonstrated how tungsten carbide can drive a chemical process known as hydrocracking.

Hydrocracking breaks large molecules into smaller ones that can be reused to make new products. In this case, the researchers focused on polypropylene, which is commonly used in water bottles and many other plastic items.

Although hydrocracking is widely used in oil and gas refining, applying it to plastic waste has been difficult. Most single-use plastics contain long polymer chains that are extremely stable, and contaminants in waste streams can quickly deactivate traditional catalysts. Platinum-based catalysts also rely on microporous supports that are too small for large polymer chains to access.

“Tungsten carbide, when made with the correct phase, has metallic and acidic properties that are good for breaking down the carbon chains in these polymers,” says Porosoff. “These big bulky polymer chains can interact with the tungsten carbide much easier because they don’t have micropores that cause limitations with typical platinum-based catalysts.”

The results showed that tungsten carbide was not only significantly cheaper than platinum catalysts for hydrocracking, but also more than 10 times as efficient. The researchers say these findings could lead to better catalyst designs and new ways to convert plastic waste into valuable materials, supporting a circular economy.

Measuring Temperature With Greater Precision

Accurate temperature measurement plays a crucial role in developing efficient catalysts. Chemical reactions either absorb heat (endothermic) or release heat (exothermic), and controlling temperature at the catalyst surface allows scientists to coordinate multiple reactions more effectively.

However, traditional temperature measurements rely on bulk readings that average conditions across a reactor. These measurements often fail to capture the precise environment at the catalyst surface, making it difficult to study reactions accurately.

To solve this problem, the research team adopted optical measurement techniques developed in the lab of Andrea Pickel, a visiting professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. They described this new approach in a study published in EES Catalysis.

“We learned from this study that depending on the type of chemistry, the temperature measured with these bulk readings can be off by 10 to 100 degrees Celsius,” says Porosoff. “That’s a really significant difference in catalytic studies where you’re trying to ensure that measurements are reproducible and that multiple reactions can be coupled.”

Using this method, the team studied tandem catalyst systems in which heat released by one reaction is used to drive another reaction that requires heat input. Pairing these reactions more precisely can reduce wasted energy and improve overall efficiency in chemical processes.

Porosoff says this technique could also influence how catalysis research is conducted more broadly, leading to better measurements, stronger reproducibility, and more reliable results across the field.

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Thomas Edison May Have Created a Miracle Material Before Physics Knew It Existed

A modern materials study suggests that Thomas Edison’s early light bulb experiments may have unknowingly produced graphene decades before the material was formally theorized or isolated.

Thomas Edison never heard the word “graphene,” yet researchers at Rice University think his work may still brush up against it. In a recent paper from chemist James Tour’s lab, the team points to graphene as an unexpected thread connecting Edison to Konstantin Novoselov and Andre Geim, the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics winners who isolated and studied the material.

Edison died nearly two decades before physicist P.R. Wallace proposed that graphene might exist, and almost 80 years before the Nobel committee recognized its experimental discovery.

Graphene is a one-atom-thick form of carbon that is both transparent and remarkably strong, with growing importance in modern devices such as semiconductors. The Rice researchers focus on a variant called turbostratic graphene, which can form when a resistive carbon material is hit with an electrical voltage and heated extremely quickly to about 2,000 to 3,000 degrees Celsius.

A 19th-Century Precursor to Flash Joule Heating

Today, that rapid electrical heating approach is known as flash Joule heating. In 1879, Edison could create similar conditions in a far more familiar way: by switching on one of his newly patented light bulbs. Early incandescent designs often relied on carbon filaments, including Japanese bamboo, rather than tungsten.

When current flowed, the filament heated rapidly and produced light, and under the right circumstances, it may have done more than glow. It may have briefly entered the temperature range where graphene can emerge.

“I was developing ways to mass produce graphene with readily available and affordable materials,” explains Lucas Eddy, first author on the paper and a former Rice graduate student in Tour’s lab. “I was looking at everything from arc welders, which were more efficient than anything I’d ever built, to lightning struck trees, which were complete dead ends.” But then, as his lab mate put it, he had a light bulb moment. “I was trying to figure out the smallest, easiest piece of equipment you could use for flash Joule heating, and I remembered that early light bulbs often used carbon-based filaments.”

Edison’s bulbs were not chosen for nostalgia. His patented design could drive a carbon filament to roughly 2,000 degrees Celsius, a temperature range considered essential for the kind of rapid carbon transformations the team wanted to test. Another practical advantage was documentation: Edison’s 1879 patent offered Eddy a detailed reference point for rebuilding the setup as closely as possible.

Recreating a Historic Experiment

Finding a truly comparable bulb took trial and error. Eddy initially bought Edison style bulbs advertised as having “carbon” filaments, only to discover the filaments were actually tungsten.

“You can’t fool a chemist,” laughs Eddy. “But I finally found a small art store in New York City selling artisan Edison-style light bulbs.” The artisan light bulbs were exactly like Edison’s, down to the Japanese bamboo filaments. Even the diameters of the filaments were close with Eddy’s filaments measuring only 5 micrometers larger than Edison’s.

Just like Edison, Eddy attached the light bulb to a 110-volt DC electricity source. He flipped the switch on for only 20 seconds. Longer periods of heating, he explains, can result in graphite forming rather than graphene.

When the filament was examined under an optical microscope, its appearance had clearly changed. The carbon had shifted from a dull dark gray to what Eddy described as a “lustrous silver.” A transformation had likely occurred, but to what?

To characterize the change, Eddy reached for a technique developed in the 1930s: Raman spectroscopy. This technique uses lasers to identify the substances through their atomic signatures, like reading a barcode. Advances over the last century allow it to do so with rather extreme precision. The spectroscopy confirmed what Eddy had hoped parts of the filament had turned into turbostratic graphene. Edison, in his quest to develop a practical light bulb that could be used in everyday life, may just have produced a substance that is quickly becoming key to the technology-dependent 21st century.

Revisiting the Past With Modern Tools

Of course, there is no way to know what really happened with Edison’s long-ago experiment. Even if the original light bulb Edison used was available to analyze, any graphene produced likely would have turned to graphite during its first 13-hour test.

“To reproduce what Thomas Edison did, with the tools and knowledge we have now, is very exciting,” said Tour, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Professor of Chemistry and corresponding author on the paper. “Finding that he could have produced graphene inspires curiosity about what other information lies buried in historical experiments. What questions would our scientific forefathers ask if they could join us in the lab today? What questions can we answer when we revisit their work through a modern lens?”

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Scientists Find a Hidden State Inside Liquid Metal That Shouldn’t Exist

Motionless atoms can trap liquid metal in a strange new state that shouldn’t exist.

Scientists have discovered that a liquid does not always behave the way it seems. Even when a material is fully molten, some of its atoms can remain fixed in place, no matter how hot it gets. These stationary atoms strongly influence how a liquid turns into a solid and can even give rise to an unusual state of matter known as a corralled supercooled liquid.

Why Solidification Matters

The process of solid formation underpins many natural phenomena, including mineralization, ice growth, and the folding of protein fibrils. It is also critical for a wide range of technologies. Pharmaceuticals rely on controlled solidification, as do metal-based industries such as aviation, construction, and electronics.

Watching Metal Freeze at the Atomic Scale

To investigate how liquids solidify, researchers from the University of Nottingham and the University of Ulm in Germany used transmission electron microscopy to observe molten metal nano droplets as they cooled. Their results were published in ACS Nano.

Professor Andrei Khlobystov, who led the research, said, “When we consider matter, we typically think of three states: gas, liquid, and solid. While the behavior of atoms in gases and solids is easier to understand and describe, liquids remain more mysterious.”

The Chaotic Motion of Liquid Atoms

Atoms inside a liquid move in a highly complex way, much like people pushing through a crowded space. They rush past one another while continuing to interact. Capturing this behavior is especially difficult during the moment when a liquid begins to freeze, even though this transition determines the final structure of the material and many of its practical properties.

Melting Nanoparticles on Graphene

Dr. Christopher Leist, who carried out the transmission electron microscopy experiments at Ulm using the low voltage SALVE instrument, said, “We began by melting metal nanoparticles, such as platinum, gold, and palladium, deposited on an atomically thin support graphene. We used graphene as a sort of hob for this process to heat the particles, and as they melted, their atoms began to move rapidly, as expected. However, to our surprise, we found that some atoms remained stationary.”

Further investigation revealed that these immobile atoms were tightly bound to the support at specific defect sites. This strong attachment held even at extremely high temperatures. By focusing the electron beam, the researchers could create more defects and directly control how many atoms stayed pinned within the liquid.

Electron Beams and a New Phase of Matter

Professor Ute Kaiser, who established the SALVE center at Ulm University, said, “Our experiments have surprised us as we directly observe the wave-particle duality of electrons in the electron beam. We visualize the material using electrons as waves. At the same time, electrons behave like particles, delivering discrete bursts of momentum that can either move or, surprisingly, even fix atoms at the edge of a liquid metal. This remarkable observation has allowed us to discover a new phase of matter.”

The team has previously used the same approach to record films of chemical reactions involving individual molecules, including the first time a chemical bond was seen breaking and reforming in real time. This technique allows scientists to observe chemistry one atom at a time.

How Stationary Atoms Change Freezing

In the new experiments, the researchers found that pinned atoms dramatically alter the way a liquid solidifies. When only a few atoms are stationary, crystals grow normally from the liquid until the entire particle becomes solid. When many atoms are fixed in place, however, this orderly process breaks down, and crystal formation is completely blocked.

Professor Andrei Khlobystov from the University of Nottingham said, “The effect is particularly striking when stationary atoms create a ring that surrounds the liquid. Once the liquid is trapped in this atomic corral, it can remain in a liquid state even at temperatures significantly below its freezing point, which for platinum can be as low as 350 degrees Celsius that is more than 1,000 degrees below what is typically expected.”

From Supercooled Liquid to Unstable Solid

When the temperature drops far enough, the trapped liquid eventually becomes solid. Instead of forming a crystal, it turns into an amorphous metal with no regular atomic pattern. This form is extremely unstable and exists only because the stationary atoms hold it in place. If that confinement is disturbed, the built-up tension is released, and the metal quickly rearranges into its normal crystalline structure.

Implications for Catalysts and Materials Science

Dr. Jesum Alves Fernandes, a catalysis expert at the University of Nottingham, said, “The discovery of a new hybrid state of metal is significant. Since platinum on carbon is one of the most widely used catalysts globally, finding a confined liquid state with non-classical phase behaviour could change our understanding of how catalysts work. This advancement may lead to the design of self-cleaning catalysts with improved activity and longevity.”

Toward Atomically Corralled Matter

Until now, nanoscale corralling had only been demonstrated for photons and electrons. This study marks the first time atoms themselves have been corralled. Professor Andrei Khlobystov said, “Our achievement may herald a new form of matter combining characteristics of solids and liquids in the same material.”

Looking ahead, the researchers aim to precisely control the placement of pinned atoms to build larger and more complex corrals. Such advances could enable more efficient use of rare metals in clean technologies, including energy conversion and storage.

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Scientists Discover That Electric Fields Flip the Rules of Water Chemistry

A new study identifies how water becomes ionized under electrochemical conditions.

Hydrogen is expected to play a major role in future energy systems, which makes a clear understanding of electrolysis increasingly important. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research and the Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge have taken a closer look at a closely related phenomenon known as water autodissociation.

Although the basic chemistry of how water splits is well understood under normal conditions, far less is known about how this process unfolds in the intense electric fields found inside electrochemical devices.

Why water rarely splits on its own

In the natural world, systems of all sizes follow a small set of fundamental rules. Objects move in ways that lower their energy, such as falling downward under gravity. At the same time, the balance between order and disorder also plays a crucial role. Over time, systems tend to become more disordered, a tendency that applies even at the molecular scale and is described by the concept of “entropy”.

Both energy and entropy shape how chemical reactions proceed. A process can occur spontaneously if it lowers energy or increases entropy, meaning greater disorder. Under everyday conditions, such as in a glass of water, water autodissociation is blocked on both fronts. It neither lowers energy nor increases disorder, which makes the reaction extremely rare. When strong electric fields are introduced, however, the situation changes and the reaction can speed up dramatically.

Electric fields flip the driving force

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research and the Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry at the University of Cambridge have now identified an unexpected mechanism that controls water autodissociation under these powerful electric fields. Their results, published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, challenge the long-held assumption that the reaction is governed mainly by energy alone.

“Water autodissociation has been extensively studied in bulk conditions, where it’s understood to be energetically uphill and entropically hindered,” says Yair Litman, group leader at the Max Planck Institute. “But under the strong electric fields typical of electrochemical environments, the reaction behaves very differently.”

Using advanced molecular dynamics simulations, Litman and co-author Angelos Michaelides show that strong fields dramatically enhance water dissociation not by making the reaction more energetically favorable, but by making it entropically favorable. The electric field initially orders water molecules into a highly structured network. When ions form, they disrupt this order, increasing the system’s entropy or disorder which ultimately drives the reaction forward.

“It’s a complete reversal of what happens at zero field,” explains Litman. “Instead of entropy resisting the reaction, it now promotes it.”

Rethinking water splitting under bias

The study also shows that under strong electric fields, the pH of water can drop from neutral (7) to highly acidic levels (as low as 3), with implications for how we understand and design electrochemical systems.

“These results point to a new paradigm,” says Michaelides. “To understand and improve water-splitting devices, we need to consider not just energy, but entropy and how electric fields reshape the molecular landscape of water.”

The research highlights the need to rethink how reactivity is modeled in aqueous environments under bias and opens up new possibilities for catalyst design, particularly in electrochemical and “on-water” reactions.

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Life on Earth May Have Started With a Frozen Poison

Researchers are uncovering how a poisonous chemical could have helped life emerge.

A chemical that is deadly to humans may have contributed to the earliest steps toward life on Earth. Hydrogen cyanide can freeze into solid crystals at low temperatures. Computer modeling work reported in ACS Central Science shows that certain crystal surfaces are highly reactive, allowing chemical reactions to occur that normally would not happen in such cold conditions. Researchers suggest these reactions may have triggered a chain process that produced several of the fundamental building blocks of life.

“We may never know precisely how life began, but understanding how some of its ingredients take shape is within reach. Hydrogen cyanide is likely one source of this chemical complexity, and we show that it can react surprisingly quickly in cold places,” says Martin Rahm, the corresponding author of the study.

Hydrogen Cyanide in Space and Prebiotic Chemistry

Hydrogen cyanide is common in environments beyond Earth. It has been found on comets and in the atmospheres of planets and moons (e.g., Saturn’s moon Titan). When hydrogen cyanide comes into contact with water, it can give rise to polymers, amino acids, and nucleobases (components of proteins and DNA strands, respectively). To better understand how this molecule behaves under frozen conditions, Marco Capelletti, Hilda Sandström and Martin Rahm used computer simulations to study solid hydrogen cyanide.

Simulating Crystal Shapes Seen in Nature

In the simulations, the team modeled a stable hydrogen cyanide crystal as a cylinder about 450 nanometers long. The structure included a rounded base and a top with multiple flat faces, similar in appearance to a cut gemstone. According to the researchers, this geometry matches earlier observations of crystal formations described as “cobwebs” that spread outward from a central point where the multifaceted ends meet.

Unexpected Chemical Activity in Extreme Cold

The calculations showed that these frozen crystals could promote chemical reactions that rarely occur in extremely cold environments. By analyzing the chemistry of the crystal surfaces, the researchers identified two reaction routes that could convert hydrogen cyanide into hydrogen isocyanide, a more reactive compound.

Depending on the temperature, this transformation could take place within minutes or over several days. The presence of hydrogen isocyanide on the crystal surface suggests that even more complex prebiotic precursors could form in these regions.

Next Steps Toward Experimental Tests

The researchers hope their predictions will be tested in laboratory experiments. One possible approach would involve crushing hydrogen cyanide crystals in the presence of substances like water. Exposing fresh crystal surfaces could reveal whether these surfaces truly encourage the formation of complex molecules at extremely low temperatures.

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This New Device Turns Carbon Emissions Into a Valuable Chemical

This new technology turns everyday carbon emissions into a useful chemical right at the source, even from thin air.

Exhaust gases released from home furnaces, fireplaces, and industrial facilities send carbon dioxide (CO2) into the atmosphere, adding to climate pollution. Scientists reporting today (January 21) in ACS Energy Letters have developed a new type of electrode that can capture CO2 from the air and immediately transform it into a useful chemical called formic acid. In laboratory tests, the system outperformed existing electrode designs when exposed to simulated flue gas and even when CO2 levels matched those found in normal outdoor air.

“This work shows that carbon capture and conversion do not need to be treated as separate steps. By integrating both functions into a single electrode, we demonstrate a simpler pathway for CO2 utilization under realistic gas conditions,” explains Wonyong Choi, a corresponding author on the study.

Why Converting CO2 Is So Challenging

Removing carbon dioxide from the air may sound straightforward after all, plants do it every day. The real challenge comes afterward. Turning captured CO2 into something useful is difficult, yet essential if carbon capture technologies are to be widely adopted. In real-world industrial exhaust, CO2 is mixed with large amounts of other gases, including nitrogen and oxygen. Most existing conversion systems only work efficiently when CO2 has already been purified and concentrated, which adds cost and complexity.

To overcome this limitation, Donglai Pan, Myoung Hwan Oh, Wonyong Choi, and their colleagues set out to create a system that could both capture and convert CO2 under realistic conditions. Their goal was to make a device that functions directly with flue gas and remains effective even when carbon dioxide is present in small amounts.

A Three-Layer Electrode Design

The researchers designed an electrode that allows gas to flow through it, trap CO2, and convert it at the same time. The device is built from three distinct layers: a material that selectively captures carbon dioxide, a sheet of gas-permeable carbon paper, and a catalytic layer made of tin(IV) oxide. Together, these components enable the direct conversion of CO2 gas into formic acid.

Formic acid is a valuable chemical used in several applications, including fuel cells and other industrial processes. Producing it directly from exhaust gases could make carbon recycling far more practical.

Strong Performance Under Realistic Conditions

When tested with pure CO2, the new electrode showed about 40% higher efficiency than existing carbon conversion electrodes under similar laboratory conditions. The difference became even more striking when the researchers switched to a simulated flue gas made up of 15% CO2, 8% oxygen gas, and 77% nitrogen gas. Under those conditions, the new system continued producing significant amounts of formic acid, while other approaches produced almost none.

The electrode also worked at CO2 concentrations similar to those found in the atmosphere, showing that it can operate in ambient air. According to the researchers, this approach could make carbon capture more practical for industrial use. They also suggest that similar designs might one day be adapted to capture and convert other greenhouse gases, such as methane.

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Algae’s Secret Sun Shield Could Revolutionize Solar Energy

A hidden pigment helps ocean algae harness sunlight without getting burned and it may hold clues for better solar tech.

Too much sunlight can spoil a beach day, and it can also damage photosynthesis, the process plants and algae use to turn light into energy. Excessive exposure can overwhelm this system, harming organisms that depend on sunlight to survive. Under the ocean surface, however, some algae have developed an effective defense.

Researchers from Osaka Metropolitan University and their collaborators found that a pigment called siphonein helps marine green algae continue photosynthesis smoothly, even under intense light.

How Photosynthesis Can Go Wrong in Strong Light

Photosynthetic organisms rely on sensitive structures known as light-harvesting complexes (LHCs) to absorb sunlight. When chlorophyll captures light, it briefly enters an excited singlet state and passes that energy to reaction centers that drive chemical processes. Under normal conditions, this transfer is efficient and safe. When light levels become too high, though, chlorophyll can shift into a harmful “triplet” state. This state can produce reactive oxygen species that cause oxidative damage to cells.

“Organisms use carotenoids to quickly dissipate excess energy, or quench these triplet states, through a process called triplet-triplet energy transfer (TTET),” said Ritsuko Fujii, lead author and associate professor at the Graduate School of Science and Research Center for Artificial Photosynthesis at Osaka Metropolitan University.

Despite its importance, the basic rules behind this protective process have remained unclear.

Why Scientists Turned to Marine Algae

To better understand how this protection works, the research team studied Codium fragile, a species of marine green algae. Like land plants, it has a light-harvesting antenna called LHCII, but it also contains unusual carotenoids, including siphonein and siphonaxanthin. These pigments allow the algae to make use of green light, which is more common underwater.

“The key to the quenching mechanism lies in how quickly and efficiently the triplet states can be deactivated,” said Alessandro Agostini, a researcher at the University of Padua in Italy and co-lead author of the study.

Measuring Algae’s Natural Sun Protection

The researchers used electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopy, a technique that can directly detect triplet excited states, to compare spinach plants with Codium fragile. In spinach, faint signals from chlorophyll triplet states were still present. In Codium fragile, those signals disappeared entirely. This showed that carotenoids in the algae were fully neutralizing the harmful states.

“Our research has revealed that the antenna structure of photosynthetic green algae has an excellent photoprotective function,” Agostini said.

Siphonein’s Role in Shielding Algae

By combining EPR results with quantum chemical simulations, the team identified siphonein as the main pigment responsible for this protection. The pigment sits at a crucial binding site within the LHCII complex. The analysis also explained how siphonein’s electronic structure and precise location make it especially effective at dispersing excess energy before it can cause damage.

These results show that marine algae have evolved specialized pigments not only to absorb the blue-green light available underwater but also to survive intense sunlight.

Implications for Future Solar Technology

Beyond shedding light on photosynthesis, the findings could help inspire bio-inspired solar technologies that include built-in protection against energy overload. Such designs could lead to renewable energy systems that are both more durable and more efficient.

“We hope to further clarify the structural characteristics of carotenoids that increase quenching efficiency, ultimately enabling the molecular design of pigments that optimize photosynthetic antennae,” Fujii said.

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New Brain Drugs Mimic Psychedelics Without the Hallucinations

Scientists at UC Davis created a new class of serotonin-targeting molecules using a light-driven chemical method.

UC Davis scientists have created a light-based technique that converts amino acids the building blocks of proteins into new molecules with psychedelic-like shapes and brain activity.

These compounds can switch on the brain’s serotonin 5-HT2A receptors, which are linked to cortical neuron growth, making them potential leads for conditions such as depression, substance-use disorder and PTSD. In animal models, though, the molecules did not produce a key behavioral sign typically associated with hallucinogenic drugs.

The research was recently published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

“The question that we were trying to answer was, ‘Is there whole new class of drugs in this field that hasn’t been discovered?” said study author Joseph Beckett, a Ph.D. student working with Professor Mark Mascal, UC Davis Department of Chemistry, and an affiliate of the UC Davis Institute for Psychedelics and Neurotherapeutics (IPN). “The answer in the end was, ‘Yes.’”

The findings point to a simpler, more environmentally friendly path for discovering serotonin-targeting medicines that may deliver psychedelic-like benefits without strongly altering perception.

“In medicinal chemistry, it’s very typical to take an existing scaffold and make modifications that just tweak the pharmacology a little bit one way or another,” said study author Trey Brasher, also a Ph.D. student in the Mascal Lab and an affiliate of IPN. “But especially in the psychedelic field, completely new scaffolds are incredibly rare. And this is the discovery of a brand-new therapeutic scaffold.”

Discovering a new therapeutic scaffold

To build their collection of candidate molecules, the team paired different amino acids with tryptamine, a metabolite of the essential amino acid tryptophan. Next, they exposed these combined molecules to ultraviolet light, reshaping them into new compounds with potential medicinal usefulness.

Computer simulations were used to test the binding affinity of 100 of these compounds at the 5-HT2A receptor.

From that set, five compounds were chosen for additional laboratory tests of efficacy and potency. The selected candidates showed efficacies ranging from 61% to 93%, with 93% indicating a full agonist a compound capable of producing the maximum biological response from the 5-HT2A system.

The team labeled the full agonist in the group as D5. They expected that administering the compound to mouse models would induce head twitch responses, a hallmark of hallucinogenic-like behaviors.

However, that wasn’t the case. Despite fully activating the same receptor as psychedelics, D5 didn’t induce head twitch responses.

“Laboratory and computational studies showed that these molecules can partially or fully activate serotonin signaling pathways linked to both brain plasticity and hallucinations, while experiments in mice demonstrated suppression of psychedelic-like responses rather than their induction,” Beckett and Brasher said.

Next steps: why no hallucinations?

The team plans to conduct follow-up studies to better understand if other serotonin receptors in the brain modulate or suppress the hallucinogenic-like effects of D5.

“We determined that the scaffold itself possesses a range of activity,” Brasher said. “But now it’s about elucidating that activity and understanding why D5 and similar molecules are non-hallucinogenic when they’re full agonists.”

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Scientists Find a Way To Make CO2 a Valuable Fuel Source

A redesigned low-cost catalyst shows unexpected durability while converting CO₂ into a useful energy carrier.

Researchers from Yale and the University of Missouri report that catalysts made with manganese can efficiently convert carbon dioxide into formate. Manganese is a common and low-cost metal, and formate is widely studied as a possible way to store and release hydrogen for future fuel-cell technologies.

The findings were published in the journal Chem. The study was led by Yale postdoctoral researcher Justin Wedal and University of Missouri graduate research assistant Kyler Virtue, with senior contributions from Yale professor Nilay Hazari and Missouri professor Wesley Bernskoetter.

Why Hydrogen Storage and Production Still Matter

Hydrogen fuel cells generate electricity by converting the chemical energy stored in hydrogen, similar in concept to how a battery operates. Despite their promise, one of the biggest obstacles to broader adoption is finding affordable and efficient methods to produce and store hydrogen at scale.

“Carbon dioxide utilization is a priority right now, as we look for renewable chemical feedstocks to replace feedstocks derived from fossil fuel,” said Hazari, the John Randolph Huffman Professor of Chemistry, and chair of chemistry, in Yale’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS).

Formic acid, which is the protonated form of formate, is already manufactured in large quantities for industrial uses such as food preservation, antibacterial treatments, and leather tanning. Scientists are also investigating it as a potential hydrogen source for fuel cells, provided it can be produced in a sustainable and practical way.

The Catalyst Problem: Cost, Stability, and Toxicity

Currently, industrial formate production involves the use of fossil fuels, and is thus not considered a sustainable option in the long-term. A more planet-friendly approach, researchers say, is to create formate from atmospheric carbon dioxide, essentially removing greenhouse gas and converting it into a useful product.

But to do this, a catalyst is required. And therein lies the challenge for researchers.

Many of the effective potential catalysts in development are based on precious metals, which are expensive, less abundant, and have high toxicity. On the other hand, metal catalysts that are more abundant, more sustainable, and less expensive have tended to be less effective since they decompose rapidly, which limits their ability to convert carbon dioxide into formate.

A Longer-Lived Manganese Design

Hazari’s team offers a new approach.

The researchers were able to extend the catalytic lifetime of manganese-based catalysts to such a degree that their effectiveness outpaced most of the precious metal catalysts. The key innovation, they said, was to stabilize the catalysts by adding another donor atom into the ligand design (ligands are atoms or molecules that bond with a metal atom and influence reactivity).

“I’m excited to see the ligand design pay off in such a meaningful way,” said Wedal.

The researchers also said their approach may be broadly applied to other catalytic transformations, beyond the conversion of carbon dioxide to formate.

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This Invisible Invention Could End Counterfeiting for Good

A new digital fingerprint developed by researchers promises to make physical products impossible to counterfeit.

Each year, businesses lose billions of dollars because products are copied or sold illegally. Researchers at the University of Copenhagen have now created a digital, legally binding fingerprint that prevents items from being counterfeited. The technology ensures that products can be authenticated and protected against unauthorized duplication.

Global trade in counterfeit goods reached an estimated value of 467 billion US dollars in 2021. Luxury items such as handbags, watches, and sunglasses are among the most recognizable examples, but imitation products now span nearly every category. Items ranging from cosmetics and toys to car parts, electronics, and even medicines are routinely counterfeited.

The impact goes far beyond lost revenue. Fake products are linked to large-scale job losses and can pose serious dangers to consumers. Counterfeit drugs and cosmetics may threaten health, while imitation electronic devices can malfunction or catch fire. Despite growing awareness, the scale of counterfeiting continues to increase each year.

A New Scientific Approach to Anti-Counterfeiting

To address this challenge, chemist Thomas Just Sørensen from the University of Copenhagen has developed a new method to stop counterfeiting at its source. Working with Danish entrepreneurs and investors, he helped create the O−KEY® technology, which assigns a unique digital identity to physical objects that cannot be replicated.

“Imagine throwing a handful of sand onto a glass plate. The grains of sand will land in a random pattern that is impossible to copy. We use exactly the same principle when we produce our artificial fingerprints,” says Thomas Just Sørensen.

The fingerprint takes the form of a transparent mark measuring one millimeter square. It can be applied directly to a product or to its packaging using a special ink filled with microscopic particles. These particles settle into a random arrangement that cannot be duplicated. The mark occupies only a tiny area, can be scanned using a standard smartphone, and functions as legally recognized proof that an item is genuine.

“The marking gives companies an unprecedented opportunity to protect their products, enforce contracts, and document authenticity down to the individual item level,” says Thomas Just Sørensen.

Unique identification of Royal Copenhagen products

Royal Copenhagen, the Danish porcelain maker, has welcomed the technology. It is among the first brands worldwide to adopt the labeling system, and early rollout results have been positive. In its initial use, the company has applied O-KEY® to follow its products from distribution through to the end consumer.

“O−KEY® has set new standards for how we protect our brand. The implementation gave us immediate transparency across our distribution chain and assurance that our products are protected with legally recognised proof. It is simple, effective and absolutely crucial,” says Allan Schefte, SVP Continental Europe Fiskars Denmark A/S.

Beyond Royal Copenhagen’s porcelain, O-KEY labels have also been applied to Kay Bojesen figures and a range of international security products, among other uses.

From university to business

The system builds on years of materials chemistry research carried out at the University of Copenhagen. Backed by the Innovation Fund and private investors, that work later developed into PUFIN-ID®, a Copenhagen-based company that now employs 16 people.

Back in 2016, Thomas Just Sørensen overheard some colleagues talking about PUFs physically unclonable functions at a conference in northern France, and became interested in developing a fingerprint that is impossible to clone. Two years of research later, the professor published a scientific article in Science Advances about his groundbreaking technology, which the company O−KEY® is built around.

Since then, the company has grown steadily and has, among other things, built its own IT infrastructure, labeling machines, and AI solution that keeps track of all the digital fingerprints that are made.

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A new book explores the link between film giant Kodak and the atomic bomb

Tales of Militant Chemistry unveils how film companies helped create weapons during the world wars



Despite the digitalization of pictures and movies, some cinephiles and moviemakers still favor film. For instance, Christopher Nolan’s 2023 blockbuster Oppenheimer, a thriller about the theoretical physicist who oversaw the Manhattan Project to develop the first atomic bomb, was shot on Kodak’s 70 millimeter film. But few of that movie’s fans know what a significant role Kodak itself played in the Manhattan Project.

In Tales of Militant Chemistry: The Film Factory in a Century of War, media and cultural historian Alice Lovejoy unveils how some of the biggest players in the photographic film industry moonlighted in arms manufacturing in the 20th century and supported the creation of history’s most devastating weapon.

Lovejoy begins her story with Kodak’s sprawling journey from a Rochester, N.Y.–based start-up producing cameras and glass plates in 1883 into a global chemical giant by the 1920s. Playing a strong supporting role in the book’s narrative is Agfa, a film production company centered in Wolfen, Germany, and Kodak’s main competitor. The two companies manufactured materials for a breadth of products, including synthetic fibers, plastic toys, pesticides, artificial flavors and painkillers. But their most well-known product was photographic film.

In the early 1900s, film was typically made of cellulose nitrate, a highly flammable material created by soaking cotton in nitric acid. The lethal hazards of nitrate film were compounded by the noxious fumes that were released should it catch fire. Indeed, these fumes were similar to the poison gas used in World War I so much so that Agfa’s filmmaking factories were well-placed to produce poison gas in abundance for Germany in the Great War.

By the 1920s, Kodak had begun selling safety film, a nonflammable film made from cellulose acetate. But nitrate film remained widely used by consumers because, until Kodak had refined and optimised the process, acetate film was more expensive and difficult to produce. Fortunately for Kodak, cellulose acetate became profitable as demand for the material, which was useful as a weatherproof coating for airplanes, skyrocketed during WWI.

Kodak’s expertise on and capacity for producing acetate en masse led to a lucrative side hustle for its subsidiary Tennessee Eastman producing a different research department explosive, or RDX, in WWII. The production of the highly potent explosive, used widely by both the Allied and Axis warring powers, required acetic acid, also involved in the production of cellulose acetate. The company churned out 570 tons of RDX a day by the end of the war and remained the United States’ sole producer of the explosive until 1999.

Tennessee Eastman’s chemical engineering expertise also made in the U.S. government’s prime choice to produce an entirely different substance fissionable uranium for the Manhattan Project. The company set up the Y-12 plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn., which used huge electromagnets to separate fissionable uranium from its heavier counterpart, nonfissionable uranium. The fissionable uranium was then sent to Los Alamos, N.M., to produce atomic bombs.

Chemistry enthusiasts may feel left wanting of details on the chemical and nuclear reactions mentioned in the book. But what Lovejoy does deliver with aplomb is tales rife with intrigue, twists and surprises worthy of the silver screen. Along the way, we meet Kodak cofounder George Eastman, who set his sights “on work instead of school” at 8 years old after his father’s death. We’re also introduced to Aleksandra Lawrik, a victim of Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II. She was displaced from Dnipro, Ukraine, to one of Agfa’s factories in Wolfen, Germany, where she was a forced laborer pouring caustic soda over wood cellulose to create synthetic textile fibers toxic work that ruined her lungs.

Throughout the narrative, Lovejoy deftly weaves a cornucopia of strands and recurring threads in politics, economics, history, biography and technology. The result is a compelling illustration of how fascinating and frightening the world of industrial chemistry can be.

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A new crystal makes magnetism twist in surprising ways

Scientists at Florida State University have developed a new type of crystalline material that displays rare and intricate magnetic behavior. The discovery could open new paths toward advanced data storage technologies and future quantum devices.

The findings, published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, show that blending two materials with nearly identical chemical makeup but very different crystal structures can produce an entirely new structure. This unexpected hybrid crystal exhibits magnetic properties that do not appear in either of the original materials

How Atomic Spins Create Magnetism

Magnetism begins at the atomic scale. In magnetic materials, each atom behaves like a tiny bar magnet because of a property called atomic spin. Spin can be pictured as a small arrow showing the direction of an atom's magnetic field.

When many atomic spins line up, either pointing the same way or in opposite directions, they generate the familiar magnetic forces used in everyday technologies like computers and smartphones. This type of orderly alignment is typical of conventional magnets.

The FSU team demonstrated that their new material behaves very differently. Instead of lining up neatly, the atomic spins organize into complex, repeating swirl patterns. These arrangements, known as spin textures, strongly influence how a material responds to magnetic fields.

Creating Magnetic Swirls Through Structural Frustration

To produce these unusual effects, the researchers intentionally combined two compounds that are chemically similar but structurally mismatched. Each compound has a different crystal symmetry, meaning the atoms are arranged in incompatible ways.

When these structures meet, neither arrangement can fully dominate. This instability at the boundary creates what scientists call structural "frustration," where the system cannot settle into a simple, stable pattern.

"We thought that maybe this structural frustration would translate into magnetic frustration,'" said co-author Michael Shatruk, a professor in the FSU Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. "If the structures are in competition, maybe that will cause the spins to twist. Let's find some structures that are chemically very close but have different symmetries."

The team tested this idea by combining a compound made of manganese, cobalt, and germanium with another made of manganese, cobalt, and arsenic. Germanium and arsenic sit next to each other on the periodic table, making the compounds chemically similar but structurally distinct.

Once the mixture cooled and crystallized, the researchers examined the result and confirmed the presence of the swirling magnetic patterns they were aiming for. These cycloidal spin arrangements are known as skyrmion-like spin textures, which are a major focus of current research in physics and chemistry.

To map the magnetic structure in detail, the team used single-crystal neutron diffraction measurements collected on the TOPAZ instrument at the Spallation Neutron Source. This U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science user facility is located at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Why These Magnetic Patterns Matter

Materials that host skyrmion-like spin textures have several promising technological advantages. One potential use is in next-generation hard drives that store far more information in the same physical space.

Skyrmions can also be moved using very little energy, which could significantly reduce power demands in electronic devices. In large-scale computing systems with thousands of processors, even modest efficiency gains can translate into major savings on electricity and cooling.

The research may also help guide the development of fault-tolerant quantum computing systems. These systems are designed to protect delicate quantum information and continue operating reliably despite errors and noise the holy grail of quantum information processing.

"With single-crystal neutron diffraction data from TOPAZ and new data-reduction and machine-learning tools from our LDRD project, we can now solve very complex magnetic structures with much greater confidence," said Xiaoping Wang, a distinguished neutron scattering scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. "That capability lets us move from simply finding unusual spin textures to intentionally designing and optimizing them for future information and quantum technologies."

Designing Materials Instead of Searching for Them

Much of the earlier work on skyrmions involved searching through known materials and testing them one by one to see whether the desired magnetic patterns appeared.

This study took a more deliberate approach. Rather than hunting for existing examples, the researchers designed a new material from the ground up, using structural frustration as a guiding principle to create specific magnetic behavior.

"It's chemical thinking, because we're thinking about how the balance between these structures affects them and the relation between them, and then how it might translate to the relation between atomic spins," Shatruk said.

By understanding the underlying rules that govern these patterns, scientists may eventually be able to predict where complex spin textures will form before making the material.

"The idea is to be able to predict where these complex spin textures will appear," said co-author Ian Campbell, a graduate student in Shatruk's lab. "Traditionally, physicists will hunt for known materials that already exhibit the symmetry they're seeking and measure their properties. But that limits the range of possibilities. We're trying to develop a predictive ability to say, 'If we add these two things together, we'll form a completely new material with these desired properties.'"

This strategy could also make future technologies more practical by expanding the range of usable ingredients. That flexibility may allow researchers to grow crystals more easily, lower costs, and strengthen supply chains for advanced magnetic materials.

Research Experience at Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Campbell completed part of the research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory while supported by an FSU fellowship.

"That experience was instrumental for this research," he said. "Being at Oak Ridge allowed me to build connections with the scientists there and use their expertise to help with some of the problems we had to solve to complete this study."

Florida State University has been a sponsoring member of Oak Ridge Associated Universities since 1951 and is also a core university partner of the national laboratory. Through this partnership, FSU faculty members, postdoctoral researchers, and graduate students can access ORNL facilities and collaborate with laboratory scientists.

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Identifying where lithium ions reside in a new solid-state electrolyte that could lead to improved batteries

Recent research published in Science introduces a promising solid electrolyte material that could improve the performance of next-generation lithium batteries, particularly at lower temperatures. Illinois Institute of Technology (Illinois Tech) Research Professor of Chemistry James Kaduk, who co-authored the paper, contributed a key finding to the research: identifying where lithium atoms reside within the crystalline structure.

The paper, "Anion Sublattice Design Enables Superionic Conductivity in Crystalline Oxyhalides," describes a new material known as lithium tantalum oxychloride (LTOC), whose high ionic conductivity and low activation energy, even in the cold, could facilitate the development of high-performance solid-state batteries.

Lithium, the lightest metal, is widely used in batteries because its ions move easily, allowing energy to be stored and released efficiently. Understanding how lithium ions move through this new material was essential to explaining LTOC's unusually strong performance.

Challenges in locating lithium atoms

"My contribution is small but ends up being useful," says Kaduk. "What really gets me excited is finding out where the atoms are."

Kaduk's task wasn't straightforward. The primary tool he often uses to map atomic structures X-ray diffraction has trouble detecting lighter elements such as hydrogen and lithium, especially when they are surrounded by heavier elements such as tantalum.

"Since X-rays scatter off electrons, lithium having only three electrons can be especially hard to find," says Kaduk.

Instead of trying to find the lithium atoms directly, Kaduk used an indirect approach by looking for empty spaces where those atoms could exist. Since atoms can't overlap, once the positions of the heavier atoms were known, Kaduk could then find small gaps between them that were large enough to accommodate lithium ions.

By gradually narrowing the size of his search, Kaduk identified a set of sites open positions within the crystal structure where small particles can fit and move through that could host lithium. Those sites sit close enough together to allow lithium ions to "hop" easily from one site to the next.

Implications for battery performance

That detail proved to be critical. The structure revealed long, rigid chains of tantalum, oxygen, and chlorine that create open channels between them. Lithium ions diffuse through those channels, moving more efficiently than in current batteries along the length of the material. This process helps create better batteries because the more freely lithium ions can move through a structure, the better a battery performs.

With the lithium positions identified, the team then tested the structure using quantum mechanical calculations to confirm that the structure would remain stable.

"We apply what are called 'density functional quantum mechanical techniques' to optimize the structure," Kaduk says. "In this case, the structure stayed very nearly the way it refined, so that provided some extra evidence for the correctness of the structure."

The open pathways revealed by the structure help explain one of the material's most promising properties: it conducts lithium ions well even at low temperatures. This property makes it especially valuable for applications ranging from electric vehicles to energy storage in cold climates.

Reflections on the research process

While his role is just one part of a much larger international collaboration, Kaduk's contribution helped turn an intriguing observation into a clearer understanding of how the material works, bringing researchers one step closer to designing better batteries.

For Kaduk, the reward comes from having solved that molecular puzzle.

"Being able to complete the job just based on some pretty simple ideas, that's very satisfying," says Kaduk. "Especially when you do the quantum mechanics calculations and see that they're pretty happy with where these lithiums were, it gives you extra confidence."

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New group of potential diabetes drugs with fewer side effects can reprogram insulin-resistant cells to be healthier

Using a blend of computer modeling, structural and cell-based studies, scientists at The Wertheim UF Scripps Institute have designed a group of potential diabetes drugs that reprogram insulin-resistant cells into a healthier state while limiting side effect risks of older medications.

An estimated 36 million people in the United States live with type 2 diabetes, a condition that develops when the body becomes resistant to insulin, the hormone that enables cells to metabolize sugar. About a third of people with this condition also have chronic kidney disease, complicating their treatment options.

In a new study, molecular biologist Patrick Griffin, Ph.D., scientific director of The Herbert Wertheim UF Scripps Institute for Biomedical Innovation & Technology, and his graduate student, Kuang-Ting Kuo, describe their methods for developing potential insulin-sensitizing medications.

Targeting PPAR gamma in diabetes treatment

The compounds target a master regulator of fat cell and insulin metabolism called PPAR gamma. The protein plays a role in diabetes, inflammation, cancers, obesity, heart disease and osteoporosis, making it a sought-after but complex medicinal target.

Short for peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma, the PPAR gamma protein is a type of nuclear receptor, meaning it binds to the cell's DNA, and can switch clusters of genes on and off.

Type 2 diabetes patients need better options, Griffin said. Uncontrolled, the condition can lead to heart disease, nerve and blood vessel damage, cognitive decline, vision problems and more. The front-line drug for type 2 diabetes, metformin, doesn't adequately improve insulin sensitivity, especially for high-risk patients with chronic kidney disease, he said. Newer diabetes drugs also carry risks for kidney disease patients, he said.

"PPAR gamma has been a notoriously difficult target, but it remains an essential one for helping patients who still lack safe, effective options," Griffin said. "What this study shows is that with the right tools and careful design, we can finally begin to overcome those barriers."

Innovative research methods and findings

To achieve their goals, Griffin's researchers used technologies including biochemical testing, an analytical technique called hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX), and computer-based modeling performed on HiPerGator, the University of Florida's supercomputer.

Biochemical tests measured how the compounds affected PPAR gamma activity in biological systems. HDX, a method that tracks subtle changes in protein shape, allowed the team to see how the different compounds influenced the structure and behavior of the PPAR gamma protein. HiPerGator also enabled the researchers to simulate the motion and flexibility of the protein connected with the best of the compounds. After the simulations, the team evaluated the compounds' ability to improve insulin sensitivity using both mouse and human fat cells.

"Our approach provides a transferable framework that can be applied to other drug discovery efforts targeting complex signaling proteins," Kuo said. "By combining computer modeling with structural measurements and cell-based testing, we can more efficiently identify compounds with favorable biological effects."

The researchers next plan to study how the compounds behave in more complex biological systems, including how they affect different body tissues, Kuo said.

Challenges and future directions in drug development

Developing medications that target PPAR gamma has been challenging, because of the multifaceted role it plays in biology. Several diabetes drugs known as glitazones, including Actos and Avandia, robustly improve insulin sensitivity by targeting PPAR gamma. However, they are also associated with serious side effects affecting the heart, bones, and, in some cases, cancer risk.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration mandates a boxed warning for all glitazones, highlighting their potential to cause or exacerbate congestive heart failure.

The Griffin laboratory has spent more than 15 years developing alternative compounds that fine-tune PPAR gamma activity. The new approach should allow researchers to more accurately predict therapeutic outcomes based on compound design before drugs move into later stages of testing, the scientists said.

Even with the power of HiPerGator, one of the fastest supercomputers in academia, the project stretched computing resources, Kuo said.

"A single 100-nanosecond molecular dynamics simulation took about six hours on HiPerGator," Kuo said. "With 26 compounds and three independent simulations per compound, the total computing time approached 20 days."

Future studies will explore how downstream molecules interact with the PPAR gamma-targeting compounds, Griffin said.

"Seeing this research accelerate in ways that directly address urgent patient needs is deeply gratifying," he said. "We're committed to translating these findings into clinical progress."

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Nanotech in Sprouts: Future Unveiled! #worldresearchawards #Analytical c...

Beyond silicon: These shape-shifting molecules could be the future of AI hardware

For more than 50 years, scientists have searched for alternatives to silicon as the foundation of electronic devices built from molecules. While the concept was appealing, practical progress proved far more difficult. Inside real devices, molecules do not behave like simple, isolated components. Instead, they interact intensely with one another as electrons move, ions shift, interfaces change, and even tiny differences in structure can trigger highly nonlinear responses. Although the potential of molecular electronics was clear, reliably predicting and controlling their behavior remained out of reach.

At the same time, neuromorphic computing, hardware inspired by the brain, has pursued a similar goal. The aim is to find a material that can store information, perform computation, and adapt within the same physical structure and do so in real time. However, today's leading neuromorphic systems, often based on oxide materials and filamentary switching, still function like carefully engineered machines that imitate learning rather than materials that naturally contain it.

Two Paths Begin to Converge

A new study from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) suggests these two long-standing efforts may finally be coming together.

In a collaboration bringing together chemistry, physics, and electrical engineering, a team led by Sreetosh Goswami, Assistant Professor at the Centre for Nano Science and Engineering (CeNSE), developed tiny molecular devices whose behavior can be tuned in multiple ways. Depending on how they are stimulated, the same device can act as a memory element, a logic gate, a selector, an analog processor, or an electronic synapse. "It is rare to see adaptability at this level in electronic materials," says Sreetosh Goswami. "Here, chemical design meets computation, not as an analogy, but as a working principle."

How Chemistry Enables Multiple Functions

This flexibility comes from the specific chemistry used to construct and adjust the devices. The researchers synthesized 17 carefully designed ruthenium complexes and studied how small changes in molecular shape and the surrounding ionic environment influence electron behavior. By adjusting the ligands and ions arranged around the ruthenium molecules, they demonstrated that a single device can display many different dynamic responses. These include shifts between digital and analog operation across a wide range of conductance values.

The molecular synthesis was carried out by Pradip Ghosh, Ramanujan Fellow, and Santi Prasad Rath, former PhD student at CeNSE. Device fabrication was led by Pallavi Gaur, first author and PhD student at CeNSE. "What surprised me was how much versatility was hidden in the same system," says Gaur. "With the right molecular chemistry and environment, a single device can store information, compute with it, or even learn and unlearn. That's not something you expect from solid-state electronics."

A Theory That Explains and Predicts Behavior

To understand why these devices behave this way, the team needed something that has often been missing in molecular electronics: a solid theoretical framework. They developed a transport model based on many-body physics and quantum chemistry that can predict device behavior directly from molecular structure. Using this framework, the researchers traced how electrons move through the molecular film, how individual molecules undergo oxidation and reduction, and how counterions shift within the molecular matrix. Together, these processes determine switching behavior, relaxation dynamics, and the stability of each molecular state.

Toward Learning Built Into Materials

The key result is that the unusual adaptability of these complexes makes it possible to combine memory and computation within the same material. This opens the door to neuromorphic hardware in which learning is encoded directly into the material itself. The team is already working to integrate these molecular systems onto silicon chips, with the goal of creating future AI hardware that is both energy efficient and inherently intelligent.

"This work shows that chemistry can be an architect of computation, not just its supplier," says Sreebrata Goswami, Visiting Scientist at CeNSE and co-author on the study who led the chemical design.

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