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Their conclusion: in extremely cold regions, it can be considerably more efficient to attach the PV modules directly to the electrolyser, i.e. to thermally couple them. This is because the waste heat from the PV modules increases the efficiency of electrolysis in this environment. The results of this study are also relevant for other cold regions on Earth, such as Alaska, Canada, and high mountain regions, for example. In these places, solar hydrogen could replace fossil fuels such as oil and petrol.

There is no scientific evidence that shows that smartphones and digital technology harm our biological cognitive abilities.

A new study disputes the prevailing hypothesis on why Mercury has a big core relative to its mantle. For decades, scientists argued that hit-and-run collisions blew away much of Mercury's rocky mantle and left the big, dense, metal core inside. But new research reveals that collisions are not to blame -- instead, the density, mass and iron content of a rocky planet's core is influenced by its distance from the sun's magnetic field.

Engineers have created an insect-scale robot that can swerve and pivot with the agility of a cheetah, giving it the ability to traverse complex terrain and quickly avoid unexpected obstacles. Small, robust robots like these could be ideal for conducting search and rescue operations or investigating other hazardous situations, such as scoping out potential gas leaks.

New research pinpoints how young children quickly learn language, opening new paths to leverage for machine learning.

Increasing our understanding of cellular processes requires information about the types of biomolecules involved, their locations, and their interactions. This requires the molecules to be labeled without affecting physiological processes (bioorthogonality). This works when the markers are very quickly and selectively coupled using small molecules and 'click chemistry.' A team of researchers has now introduced a novel type of click reaction that is also suitable for living cells and organisms.

In 1934, physicist Eugene Wigner theorized that when electrons in metals are brought to ultracold temperatures, these electrons would be frozen in their tracks and form a rigid, non-electricity conducting structure -- a crystal -- instead of zipping around at thousands of kilometers per second and creating an electric current. The structure was coined a Wigner Crystal and was observed for the first time in 1979. What's remained stubbornly elusive to physicists, however, has been the melting of the crystal state into a liquid in response to quantum fluctuations. Now, almost 90 years later, physicists have finally experimentally documented this transition.

Our universe is expanding, but our two main ways to measure how fast this expansion is happening have resulted in different answers. An astronomer gives an overview of the most recent observations. New conclusion: the latest observations are beginning to close the gap. That is, there may not be a conflict after all, and our standard model of the universe does not need to be significantly modified.