Nature of Water News

May 31, 2024

Top Headlines

Performance of Eco-Friendly Cooling Applications Enhanced

May 28, 2024 — Researchers have developed a sustainable and controllable strategy to manipulate interfacial heat transfer, paving the way for improving the performance of eco-friendly cooling in various applications such as electronics, buildings and solar ...

Breakthrough Discovery Uses Engineered Surfaces to Shed Heat

May 24, 2024 — Splash a few drops of water on a hot pan and if the pan is hot enough, the water will sizzle and the droplets of water seem to roll and float, hovering above the surface. The temperature at which this phenomenon, called the Leidenfrost effect, ...

Expanding on the Fundamental Principles of Liquid Movement

May 20, 2024 — We are living in a world surrounded by liquid and flow, and understanding the principles that govern its movement is vital in our high-tech world. Through mathematical modeling and experimentation, researchers have expanded on Tanner's Law -- a law ...

Airborne Technology Brings New Hope to Map Shallow Aquifers in Earth's Most Arid Deserts

May 16, 2024 — The new technique will map the top of the aquifer, called the 'water table,' spanning areas as large as hundreds of kilometers using a radar mounted on a high-altitude aircraft. According to the ...

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Harnessing Green Energy from Plants Depends on Their Circadian Rhythms

May 28, 2024 — Plant hydraulics drive the biological process that moves fluids from roots to plant stems and leaves, creating streaming electric potential, or voltage, in the process. A study closely examined the ...

Scientists Use Generative AI to Answer Complex Questions in Physics

May 16, 2024 — Researchers used generative AI to develop a physics-informed technique to classify phase transitions in materials or physical systems that is much more efficient than existing machine-learning ...

'Forever Chemicals' Found to Rain Down on All Five Great Lakes

May 16, 2024 — Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, also known as PFAS or 'forever chemicals,' have become persistent pollutants in the air, water and soil. Because they are so stable, they can be ...

Studying Bubbles Can Lead to More Efficient Biofuel Motors

May 15, 2024 — By studying how bubbles form in a drop of biodiesel, researchers can help future engines get the most energy out of the ...

Petroleum, Chlorine Mix Could Yield Harmful Byproducts

May 14, 2024 — A new study shows that chlorine mixed with petroleum in water can potentially produce inadvertent byproducts harmful to human ...

Getting Dirty to Clean Up the Chemical Industry's Environmental Impact

May 9, 2024 — The global chemical industry is a major fossil fuel consumer and climate change contributor; however, new research has identified how the sector could clean up its green credentials by getting ...

The Big Quantum Chill: Scientists Modify Common Lab Refrigerator to Cool Faster With Less Energy

May 1, 2024 — Scientists have dramatically reduced the time and energy required to chill materials to temperatures near absolute zero. Their prototype refrigerator ...

A Virus Could Help Save Billions of Gallons of Wastewater Produced by Fracking

Apr. 30, 2024 — An estimated 168 billion gallons of wastewater -- or produced water -- is generated annually by the Permian Basin fracking industry, according to a ...

Physicists Show That Light Can Generate Electricity Even in Translucent Materials

Apr. 29, 2024 — Some materials are transparent to light of a certain frequency. When such light is shone on them, electrical currents can still be generated, ...

Energy Trades Could Help Resolve Nile Conflict

Apr. 26, 2024 — Scientists have shed light on a new, transformative approach that could help resolve a dispute over the Nile river's water ...

Freeze Casting: A Guide to Creating Hierarchically Structured Materials

Apr. 25, 2024 — Freeze casting is an elegant, cost-effective manufacturing technique to produce highly porous materials with custom-designed hierarchical architectures, well-defined pore orientation, and ...

How Light Can Vaporize Water Without the Need for Heat

Apr. 24, 2024 — Researchers discovered that light can cause evaporation of water from a surface without the need for heat. This 'photomolecular effect' could be important for understanding climate change ...

Laser-Treated Cork Absorbs Oil for Carbon-Neutral Ocean Cleanup

Apr. 23, 2024 — Researchers use laser treatments to transform ordinary cork into a powerful tool for treating oil spills. They tested variations of a fast-pulsing laser treatment, closely examining the nanoscopic ...

Octopus Inspires New Suction Mechanism for Robots

Apr. 18, 2024 — A new robotic suction cup which can grasp rough, curved and heavy stone, has been developed by ...

Data-Driven Music: Converting Climate Measurements Into Music

Apr. 18, 2024 — A geo-environmental scientist from Japan has composed a string quartet using sonified climate data. The 6-minute-long composition -- entitled 'String Quartet No. 1 'Polar Energy ...

Trash to Treasure -- Researchers Turn Metal Waste Into Catalyst for Hydrogen

Apr. 16, 2024 — Scientists have found a way to transform metal waste into a highly efficient catalyst to make hydrogen from water, a discovery that could make hydrogen production more ...

Physicists Explain--and Eliminate--Unknown Force Dragging Against Water Droplets on Superhydrophobic Surfaces

Apr. 16, 2024 — Researchers adapt a novel force measurement technique to uncover the previously unidentified physics at play at the thin air-film gap between water droplets and superhydrophobic ...

Tiny Plastic Particles Are Found Everywhere

Apr. 9, 2024 — Microplastic particles can be found in the most remote ocean regions on earth. In Antarctica, pollution levels are even higher than previously ...

Physics of Complex Fluids: Ring Polymers Show Unexpected Motion Patterns Under Shear

Apr. 4, 2024 — An international research team is attracting the attention of experts in the field with computational results on the behavior of ring polymers under shear forces: They showed that for the simplest ...

'Tug of War' Tactic Enhances Chemical Separations for Critical Materials

Apr. 3, 2024 — Lanthanide elements are important for clean energy and other applications. To use them, industry must separate mixed lanthanide sources into individual elements using costly, time-consuming, and ...

For Mining in Arid Regions to Be Responsible, We Must Change How We Think About Water

Apr. 3, 2024 — In an unprecedented study of the South American 'Lithium Triangle,' hydrologists discover that not all water responds the same way to environmental change and human ...

Water-Based Paints: Less Stinky, but Some Still Contain Potentially Hazardous Chemicals

Apr. 3, 2024 — Choosing paint for your home brings a lot of options: What kind of paint, what type of finish and what color? Water-based paints have emerged as 'greener' and less smelly than solvent-based ...

Intelligent Liquid

Apr. 3, 2024 — Researchers have developed a programmable meta-fluid with tunable springiness, optical properties, viscosity and even the ability to transition between a Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluid. The ...

A Simple Way to Harvest More 'Blue Energy' from Waves

Apr. 3, 2024 — As any surfer will tell you, waves pack a powerful punch. Now, we are one step closer to capturing the energy behind the ocean's constant ebb and flow with an improved 'blue energy' ...

New Approach to Monitoring Freshwater Quality Can Identify Sources of Pollution, and Predict Their Effects

Mar. 28, 2024 — Analysing the diversity of organic compounds dissolved in freshwater provides a reliable measure of ecosystem health, say ...

With a New Experimental Technique, Engineers Probe the Mechanisms of Landslides and Earthquakes

Mar. 25, 2024 — Researchers developed a method for 3D experiments that can reveal how forces are transmitted through granular materials, and how the shapes of the grains can dramatically change the outcomes. This ...

New All-Liquid Iron Flow Battery for Grid Energy Storage

Mar. 25, 2024 — A new iron-based aqueous flow battery shows promise for grid energy storage ...

Revolutionizing Hydrogen Production: Economical and Efficient Solutions Unveiled

Mar. 22, 2024 — Scientists introduce superaerophobic three-dimensional nickel nanostructured catalysts for accelerated water ...

Research Suggests How Turbulence Can Be Used to Generate Patterns

Mar. 20, 2024 — Physicists show how patterns can emerge from chaos in turbulent ...

Molecular Crystal Motors Move Like Microbes When Exposed to Light

Mar. 19, 2024 — At first glance, Rabih Al-Kaysi's molecular motors look like the microscopic worms you'd see in a drop of pond water. But these wriggling ribbons are not alive; they're made from ...