Ready for trial operation… Senator Kristina Vogt and Lord Mayor of Bremerhaven Melf Grantz are launching trial operation at the Hydrogen Lab Bremerhaven (HLB) together with the Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy Systems IWES. The infrastructure is thus now ready for the research work in Bremerhaven focusing on the interaction between wind turbines and electrolytic hydrogen production to begin. The HLB received a total of €16 million in funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the State of…
… and help combat global warming. A significant breakthrough in developing a passive radiative cooling (PRC) material has been announced by researchers at City University of Hong Kong (CityU). The findings have just been published in the prestigious scientific journal Science titled “Hierarchically structured passive radiative cooling ceramic with high solar reflectivity.” The material, known as cooling ceramic, has achieved high-performance optical properties for energy-free and refrigerant-free cooling generation. Its cost-effectiveness, durability and versatility make it highly suitable for commercialisation…
… in the heart of Silicon Saxony and Europe. Modern electronics developments require state-of-the-art technologies and manufacturing processes, which are a financial challenge for many companies. Located in the heart of Silicon Saxony, Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems IPMS offers both large chip manufacturers and smaller companies access to the latest research results and technologies on 200 and 300 mm silicon wafers. Services range from consulting and process development to pilot production. Green ICT – i.e. sustainability – is also…
… low-cost and multifunctional. A research team led by The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has developed a microprinter that can print piezoelectric films 100 times faster for the production of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) for sensors, wearable or implantable medical devices, offering the possibility to lower the mass production costs. The microprinter, built at a comparatively lower cost as compared with other printers on the market, utilizes an electrostatic field to propel streams of ink onto a…
One of the crucial questions of transforming mobility is “how can e-vehicles be manufactured sustainably and economically at the same time?” The Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology ILT in Aachen, Germany, which has developed electrifying solutions for laser technology together with industrial partners, has several answers. nLight Plasmo, Precitec and 4D Photonics, among others, will be presenting the monitoring of laser-welded joints at the LSE – Laser Symposium Electromobility 2024 on 23 and 24 January, 2024. The companies will be…
New electronic device switches on and off heat at top speed with precision. A team of researchers from UCLA has unveiled a first-of-its-kind stable and fully solid-state thermal transistor that uses an electric field to control a semiconductor device’s heat movement. The group’s study, which will be published in the Nov. 3 issue of Science, details how the device works and its potential applications. With top speed and performance, the transistor could open new frontiers in heat management of computer…
Finding the best material to make solar cells is a colossal task, but a research team at Osaka University has been using robotic systems and AI to make the search faster and more efficient. Solar energy is one of the most promising ways to power the world of the future. However, creating more efficient solar cells requires finding new and better materials. Now, in a study recently published in JACS Au, researchers at Osaka University have unveiled a solution: a…
In recent years, engineers at ETH Zurich have developed the technology to produce liquid fuels from sunlight and air. In 2019, they demonstrated the entire thermochemical process chain under real conditions for the first time, in the middle of Zurich, on the roof of ETH Machine Laboratory. These synthetic solar fuels are carbon neutral because they release only as much CO2 during their combustion as was drawn from the air for their production. Two ETH spin-offs, Climeworks and Synhelion, are…
The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE has developed and successfully commissioned the world’s first medium-voltage string inverter for large-scale power plants. By feeding power into the medium-voltage grid, the “MS-LeiKra” project team has demonstrated that PV inverters are technically capable of handling higher voltage levels. The benefits for photovoltaics include enormous cost and resource savings for passive components and cables. The device lays the foundation for a new system concept for the next generation of large-scale PV power…
… nominated on TIME’s 2023 list of Best Innovations. This is the first time for a prototype stemming from a research center based in Italy to be acknowledged in TIME’s prestigious list. The prototype has been realized by Mario Caironi’s group at IIT in Milano; his research is supported by the ERC. From the research lab to TIME’s 2023 list of Best Innovations, IIT-Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (Italian Institute of Technology) makes a hit with the first ever-made rechargeable edible…
It’s viable to produce low-cost, lightweight solar panels that can generate energy in space, according to new research from the Universities of Surrey and Swansea. The first study of its kind followed a satellite over six years, observing how the panels generated power and weathered solar radiation over 30,000 orbits. The findings could pave the way for commercially viable solar farms in space. Professor Craig Underwood, Emeritus Professor of Spacecraft Engineering at the Surrey Space Centre at the University of…
Next-generation solar materials are cheaper and more sustainable to produce than traditional silicon solar cells, but hurdles remain in making the devices durable enough to withstand real-world conditions. A new technique developed by a team of international scientists could simplify the development of efficient and stable perovskite solar cells, named for their unique crystalline structure that excels at absorbing visible light. The scientists, including Penn State faculty Nelson Dzade, reported in the journal Nature Energy their new method for creating more durable…
The food industry generates enormous amounts of waste and by-products, including from poultry production. Each year, some 40 million tonnes of chicken feathers are incinerated. This not only releases large amounts of CO2, but also produces toxic gases such as sulphur dioxide. Researchers at ETH Zurich and Nanyang Technological University Singapore (NTU) have now found a way to put these feathers to good use. Using a simple and environmentally friendly process, they extract the protein keratin from the feathers and…
Kiel University and Trinity College Dublin receive €2.5 million EU funding to develop particularly reliable and sustainable transformers. When power fails in data centres, the damage is often great: not only is the operation of companies or institutions interrupted, but important data can also be lost. In addition, the facilities are known for their high energy consumption. The goal of the research project “Super-HEART” is a power supply that can reliably use several sustainable energy sources such as hydrogen and…
Bio-machine hybrid robots (BHRs) represent a new generation of micro-aerial vehicles that be controlled by building an interface between biological and artificial systems. In contrast to conventional bionic robots, they are free of complex mechanical structures, and due to the direct adoption of the animal body, they have superior moving characteristics and lower energy demand. Thus, the BHRs can be applied in many important scenarios, such as urban and wilderness rescue operations, environmental monitoring and hazardous area surveys. To accomplish…
… boost photo-induced superconductivity in K₃C₆₀. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for the Structure and Dynamics of Matter (MPSD) in Hamburg, Germany, have long been exploring the effect of using tailored laser drives to manipulate the properties of quantum materials away from equilibrium. One of the most striking demonstrations of these physics has been in unconventional superconductors, where signatures of enhanced electronic coherences and super-transport have been documented in the resulting non-equilibrium states. However, these phenomena have not yet…
Feedback
