New Atlas

Energy Audio available

Real-world-ready artificial leaf can pluck carbon dioxide out of thin air

Michael Irving February 13, 2019

Over the last few years humans have tried to mimic nature with artificial leaves, but they’re never quite up to scratch. Now, researchers have designed a new version that could work under real-world conditions, sucking carbon dioxide out of the air and creating oxygen and synthetic fuels.

Researchers have developed a new design of artificial leaf that's able to pull carbon dioxide out ...

Environment Audio available

Fish found thriving in waters with almost no oxygen

Michael Irving January 20, 2019

During a recent expedition to the Gulf of California, a team of marine biologists discovered huge schools of fishes living in an environment that’s almost completely devoid of oxygen – levels well below the amount previously thought necessary for these animals.

A lollipop catshark, which was recently discovered thriving in an environment with far less oxygen than ...

Environment Audio available

New study finds oceans are warming up much faster than previously thought

Michael Irving November 5, 2018

The oceans are heating up at an alarming rate, and it turns out that the problem may be worse than we initially thought. A new study has used a more accurate technique to measure the rate of ocean warming, and found that it could be 60 percent higher than the current worst-case scenario suggests.

A new study has found that the rate of ocean warming as a result of climate ...

Medical

Superbugs might meet their match in oxygen weaponized by light

Michael Irving August 20, 2018

To avoid a future where once-routine procedures become life-threatening again, new ways to fight bacteria need to be developed. A new study has now shown oxygen can be weaponized against antibiotic-resistant bacteria, by way of nanoparticles activated by light.

Researchers have developed a new weapon against antibiotic-resistant bacteria, where light is used to produce reactive ...

Physics

X-rays from deep space help track down the universe's missing matter

Michael Irving June 21, 2018

Ordinary (or baryonic) matter is relatively rare in the universe, and there seems to be a huge chunk of it missing. After 20 years of scouring the sky, astronomers using the ESA’s XMM-Newton observatory have now found clues to this missing matter hiding in intergalactic gas.

Astronomers have found evidence of the universe's "missing matter" lurking in intergalactic gas between filaments of ...

Space

Most distant breath of oxygen dates back to the Cosmic Dawn

Michael Irving May 16, 2018

Elements like oxygen, carbon and nitrogen weren’t very common until the first stars had fired up, burnt out and exploded. Now, astronomers using ALMA have detected the most distant – and hence, earliest – signature of oxygen, in a galaxy 13.28 billion light-years away.

"Cosmic Dawn" was the time when the first stars began lighting up the universe, ionizing the ...

Materials

Aluminum oxide coatings move like liquids to combat corrosion

Michael Irving April 9, 2018

Metals may seem tough, but given enough time even plain old air can be their undoing. An MIT team has found that aluminum can be protected from oxidation by a thin coating of aluminum oxide, which acts like a liquid, flowing to fill any gaps as they form.

Extremely thin layers of aluminum oxide (center) act like a liquid, protecting aluminum (bottom) from oxidation ...

Environment

Oldest "oxygen oasis" marks Earth's first breath of fresh air

Michael Irving January 19, 2018

Billions of years ago, the Great Oxygenation Event wiped out most life on Earth at the time. This ramped up about 2.5 billion years ago, but now scientists have discovered signs of the oldest known “oxygen oasis” in South Africa, showing that the process started almost half a billion years earlier.

Sediment studies of the Pongola Basin, South Africa, have now found that the area was home ...

Wearables

Humon Hex fitness tracker measures muscle oxygen levels

Rich Haridy January 7, 2018

What initially started out as a MIT research project has now become the Humon Hex, a fitness wearable that can measure how an athlete’s muscles are using oxygen in real time.

The Humon Hex can offer real-time muscle oxygenation levels allowing a person to adjust their exertion ...

Energy

MIT membrane produces fuel from CO2 emissions

Rich Haridy November 27, 2017

Researchers at MIT have developed a new membrane-based system that can convert carbon dioxide emissions into useful alternate fuels. The process has been effectively demonstrated on a small-scale and the researchers hope to ultimately adapt the system to conventional fossil fuel-based power plants.

A membrane developed by MIT researchers can isolate carbon monoxide from carbon dioxide, allowing polluting greenhouse ...