Trinity College Dublin

The humble eggshell has been used to recover rare earth elements essential to green energy technologies

Materials

Essential rare earth elements pulled from water using eggshells

Using humble waste eggshells to pull rare earth elements from water, researchers have developed a simple, low-cost and sustainable procedure to provide the essential materials needed for a transition to green energy technologies.

Students are examining ways to make Bitcoin more appealing to a wider range of businesses (Image: Shutterstock)

Good Thinking

Students look to improve bitcoin transparency

In an effort to make bitcoin more attractive to a wider range of legitimate businesses, students at Trinity College Dublin are looking for ways to increase transparency in transactions without ditching the anonymity altogether and believe a "credit-check" database could be one answer.

Harvard University labs are offering a downloadable toolkit to design, create, and control soft robots (Photo: Harvard SEAS)

Robotics

Soft robotics "toolkit" features everything a robot-maker needs

Harvard University labs are offering a comprehensive online Soft Robotics Toolkit to help in the design, creation, and control of soft robots made from flexible materials. The toolkit contains downloadable, open-source plans, step-by-step tutorial videos, and real world studies.