Lifeboat Foundation

Tiny insects known as sharpshooters excrete by catapulting urine drops at incredible accelerations. Their excretion is the first example of superpropulsion discovered in a biological system.

Saad Bhamla was in his backyard when he noticed something he had never seen before: an insect urinating. Although nearly impossible to see, the insect formed an almost perfectly round droplet on its tail and then launched it away so quickly that it seemed to disappear. The tiny insect relieved itself repeatedly for hours.

Continue reading “Physics of Superpropulsion: Super-Fast Sharpshooter Insect Urination Using a ‘Butt Flicker’” »

Technological and engineering advances let researchers delve deeper into cell function and behavior in physiological and pathological settings.

Saad Bhamla was in his backyard when he noticed something he had never seen before: an insect urinating. Although nearly impossible to see, the insect formed an almost perfectly round droplet on its tail and then launched it away so quickly that it seemed to disappear. The tiny insect relieved itself repeatedly for hours.

It’s generally taken for granted that what goes in must come out, so when it comes to fluid dynamics in animals, the research is largely focused on feeding rather than excretion. But Bhamla, an assistant professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology, had a hunch that what he saw wasn’t trivial.

“Little is known about the fluid dynamics of excretion, despite its impact on the morphology, energetics, and behavior of animals,” Bhamla said. “We wanted to see if this tiny insect had come up with any clever engineering or physics innovations in order to pee this way.”

Water is a vital resource, and clean water is a necessity. Texas A&M University researchers have developed a new technique to monitor one of the key processes of purifying water in real time.

Raw water contains microscopic pathogens that are too small to remove during water and wastewater treatment easily. Chemicals are added to form large clumps called flocs, which are easily filtered out. Flocculation is the process used in water treatment to remove suspended particles from the water.

“Coagulant chemicals need to be added to purify drinking water and remove turbidity (cloudiness) and microbes that are too small to be visible to the naked eye,” said Dr. Kuang-An Chang, professor in the Zachry Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Texas A&M.

A new form of heterostructure of layered two-dimensional (2D) materials may enable quantum computing to overcome key barriers to its widespread application, according to an international team of researchers.

The researchers were led by a team that is part of the Penn State Center for Nanoscale Science (CNS), one of 19 Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers (MRSEC) in the United States funded by the National Science Foundation. Their work was published Feb. 13 in Nature Materials.

A regular computer consists of billions of transistors, known as bits, and are governed by binary code (“0” = off and “1” = on). A quantum bit, also known as a qubit, is based on quantum mechanics and can be both a “0” and a “1” at the same time. This is known as superposition and can enable quantum computers to be more powerful than the regular, classical computers.

Prof. Ding Junfeng and his team from the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HFIPS) of the Chinese Academy of Science, together with Prof. Zhang Genqiang from the University of Science and Technology of China, have achieved band gap optimization and photoelectric response enhancement of carbon nitride in the nitrogen vacancy graphite phase under high pressure.

Their results were published in the journal Physical Review Applied.

Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C₃N₄) has performed well in many fields, such as high-efficiency photocatalytic hydrogen production and water oxidation. However, the wide band gap of 2.7 eV of the original g-C₃N₄ limits its light absorption in the visible region. High pressure technology is an effective strategy to change the properties while remaining composition. Therefore, band gap engineering of g-C₃N₄ by high-pressure technology can significantly enhance its photocatalytic activity and improve its application potential.

From regulators to researchers and most industries in between, all eyes are on PFAS, per-and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of highly fluorinated human-made compounds that have been used for decades in everything from nonstick cookware and personal care products to fire-fighting foams and school uniforms. Their commonality and extreme resistance to environmental degradation has made them ubiquitous in ground water, soil, and worst of all humans. Linked to a slew of health risks including liver toxicity, bladder cancer, and decreased immune response to vaccinations, exposure to PFAS is concerning. So, how can we eliminate these “forever chemicals?”

Historically, PFAS substances have only been characterized in water and soil, but the emission of these compounds during chemical manufacturing, use, and disposal results in their emission into the air. Ryan Sullivan, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University, has been developing new methods to measure PFAS in both the atmosphere and in aerosol particles to answer outstanding questions regarding PFAS atmospheric components that lead to human exposure. His group is also developing new approaches to destroy forever molecules that are not removed by conventional water treatment plants.

The research is published in the journal Environmental Science: Processes & Impacts.

The plan is to dispatch a swarm of satellites in the lower Earth orbit to stop Elon Musk from monopolizing the low-Earth orbit space, claims a report.

China allegedly plans to deploy a swarm of satellites in low Earth orbit to compete with Elon Musk’s Starlink and offer internet services, an alternative to people worldwide.

The plan to dispatch almost 13,000 satellites to throttle Starlink exposure comes under the mysterious project, code name “GW,” according to People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) space engineering researchers.

Electronic devices generate heat, and that heat must be dissipated. If it isn’t, the high temperatures can compromise device function, or even damage the devices and their surroundings.

Now, a team from UIUC and UC Berkeley have published a paper in Nature Electronics detailing a new cooling method that offers a host of benefits, not the least of which is space efficiency that offers a substantial increase over conventional approaches in devices’ power per unit volume.

Tarek Gebrael, the lead author and a PhD student in mechanical engineering, explains that the existing solutions suffer from three shortcomings. “First, they can be expensive and difficult to scale up,” he says. Heat spreaders made of diamond, for example, are sometimes used at the chip level, but they aren’t cheap.