ScienceDaily: Matter & Energy News

A new method for creating one of chemistry's most widely used class of compounds could revolutionize industrial processes, making them cheaper, simpler and more environmentally friendly.

Researchers have discovered a path that could lead to shape-shifting ceramic materials. This discovery could improve everything from medical devices to electronics.

The social cost of nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas that is the largest remaining threat to the ozone layer, is understated, concludes an international team of researchers. In their assessment, the authors write that improving the accuracy of these calculations would not only give a more accurate picture of the impact of climate change, but also spur nations to more aggressively address it.

Chemotherapy successfully treats many forms of cancer, but the side effects can wreak havoc on the rest of the body. Delivering drugs directly to cancer cells could help reduce these unpleasant symptoms. Now, in a proof-of-concept study, researchers have made fish-shaped microrobots that are guided with magnets to cancer cells, where a pH change triggers them to open their mouths and release their chemotherapy cargo.

A research group presents a new simulation method for describing the attachment of a liquid to a surface.

Northwestern University researchers have invented a new high-resolution camera that can see the unseen -- including around corners and through scattering media, such as skin, fog or potentially even the human skull.

Recycling carbon dioxide, especially through conversion to methane, is compelling while anthropogenic CO2 emissions are still rising. A useful process for this transformation is photothermal methanation, in which CO2 and hydrogen are catalytically converted into CH4 and water upon irradiation with sunlight. A team of researchers has now reported the synthesis of a highly active, stable, nickel–carbon catalyst for this reaction.

Researchers have obtained new insights into the process of crystallization in glasses that can lead to a loss of transparency and mechanical strength. The researchers are the first to relate the coordinated atomic dynamics that lead to "devitrification" with a physical mechanism. This research may lead to improvements in the long term stability of industrial glass.

Physicists have created a theory describing how non-reciprocity can be induced at the quantum level, paving the way for non-reciprocal transport in the next generation of nanotechnology.