Mexican startup Greenfluidics has turned algae farms into solar panels. The company is expanding a concept introduced in Germany in 2013 by Splitterwerk Architects and building firm Arup. The two put flat glass tanks, resembling solar panels, on the outside of a building. The tanks are filled with green algae. The algae are fed carbon...
Category: TRENDS IN HI-TECH SCIENCE
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WHAT TOMORROW’S ELECTRICITY GENERATING PLANT LOOKS LIKE
On 22 June, electric car maker Tesla invited 25,000 California households that have installed its Powerwall home electricity storage device to become part of the world’s largest virtual power plant—in effect, a distributed battery. Powerwalls are batteries that store energy generated by solar panels. Tesla’s effort is part of the Emergency Load Reduction Program established...
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AUTOMATED TOOTH-BRUSHING—WITHOUT THE BRUSH
Brush. Floss. Rinse. Repeat. Every day. At least twice. For the rest of your life. Or not, if an invention by a multidisciplinary team at the University of Pennsylvania works out. The group has created nanoparticles mainly made of iron oxide—the stuff of rust—that can swarm teeth in your mouth, clean them more effectively than...
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RESEARCHERS GROW CROPS WITHOUT SUNLIGHT
We learned it in grade school: plants grow by using carbon dioxide and sunshine in a process called photosynthesis. Or not. At the University of California Riverside, scientists are growing crops in the dark to see if they can improve energy efficiency. Photosynthesis uses only about 1 percent of the solar power that plants collect....
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SIMPLE ENZYME COULD END OBESITY, EATING DISORDERS
German researchers have discovered that an enzyme called autotaxin can control eating disorders and may be able to cure or prevent obesity. In Germany alone, 67 percent of men and 53 percent of women are overweight and 23 percent of adults are obese, the Robert Koch Institute has calculated. In the U.S., 41.9 percent of...
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BACTERIA PRODUCE ENERGY-DENSE JET FUEL
Bacteria have been around longer than dinosaurs and are still capable of making energy-dense fuel even if dinosaurs aren’t, as long as the bugs have some human help. Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory started with a molecule called a polycyclopropanated fatty acid methyl ester (POP-FAME). A POP-FAME holds carbon atoms bound at sharp angles,...
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NEW CHEMICAL FORMULA COULD GROW ORGANISMS FROM SCRATCH
Stem cells—the versatile cells that, on demand, can become other cells to make up muscle tissue or bone or an organ—aren’t all the same. “Multipotent” stem cells are common in the body’s tissues and can become different kinds of cells within the body part where they’re found. “Pluripotent” stem cells are the ones in embryos...
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MOBILE ELECTRIC POWER NANOGRID GOES WHERE IT’S NEEDED
Michigan-based Sesame Solar has created what it calls “the world’s first 100-percent renewably powered mobile nanogrid” in sizes from 10 feet long to 40-foot shipping container. The boxy trailers can be hauled by anything from pickup trucks to helicopters to natural disaster sites, temporary off-grid operations, or similar places, be set up in as little...
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DOES MANUFACTURING’S FUTURE LOOK LIKE SINGAPORE?
Singapore’s manufacturing sector made up 27 percent of GDP in 2005. Then, like most advanced countries, the number began to slip, accounting for just 18 percent by 2013. Singapore gradually became a service economy known as a financial center. But last year, factory output was worth 22 percent of Singapore’s GDP, making it one of...
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A BATTERY THAT RUNS ON WATER
When designers at Alsym Energy decided to take a fresh look at batteries, they set four standards for whatever they would create: it had to be cheap, recyclable, use materials that were abundant, and avoid getting stuck in supply-chain snarls. They developed a battery based on water. Alsym’s new power cell uses no cobalt, lithium,...
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