Vitruvius’ De architectura was by no means the only book rediscovered from antiquity that dealt with the construction and use of machines and the Renaissance artist-engineers were also not the only authors producing new texts on machines. In this episode of our series, we are going to look at another stream of writings that led to some […]

Chemists have made a molecular dodecahedron out of silicon for the first time. Siladodecahedrane has terminal hydrogens, similar to a diamondoid structure, and has 12 pentagonal faces like the smallest fullerene, C20. As recently as 2020, theoretical analyses indicated that it would be kinetically unfeasible to synthesise silafulleranes (SinHn). Now, by using a chloride ion […]

A study of the publications of almost 6 million researchers over 20 years suggests that men produce more papers than women, even after correcting for age. Show Fullscreen The authors, who’ve published their research as an as yet unpeer-reviewed preprint, based their analysis on the Scopus database and used an algorithmic approach to determine whether […]

Chemically recyclable polymers with thermal stabilities comparable to those of commercial plastics have been created by scientists in the US. The materials can be broken down into their building blocks and then reassembled into new plastic many times over – a dream for sustainable plastics, though one whose commercial reality might still be a long […]

There is significant movement afoot to ban per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs) in Europe – a class of persistent, highly mobile and potentially toxic compounds. The governments of Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and Norway have announced that by July 2022 they will formally propose to the European Chemicals Agency (Echa) that these chemicals be restricted […]

Switzerland will now be treated as a non-associated third country in the EU’s major research funding programmes, including Horizon Europe. The European commission’s decision comes during a period of rocky relations between the EU and Switzerland and could have damaging consequences for Swiss research. Although not an EU member, Switzerland has previously participated in European […]

Ethylene – a key feedstock in plastic manufacturing – is among the five top-selling compounds in the chemical industry. Now, two teams have independently discovered new electrocatalytic processes to prepare pure ethylene selectively and efficiently. Importantly, these reactions work under ambient conditions using abundant copper catalysts, providing a greener alternative to traditional solutions. Most ethylene […]

At June’s G7 meeting, leaders pledged to take action to decarbonise industrial sectors such as chemicals and petrochemicals by harnessing collective strengths in science and innovation. The chemicals sector has some catching up to do if it’s to achieve the deep decarbonisation required to put the world on track to avoid the most dangerous increases […]

A US federal grand jury has indicted four Chinese nationals for their alleged participation in a global computer hacking campaign to steal intellectual property and confidential business information related to various research areas, including chemicals and infectious diseases. The indictment, announced by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) on 19 July and unsealed just days […]

Large and unusual DNA entities have been discovered coexisting in methane-metabolising microbes that may play a role in regulating global greenhouse gas emissions. They possess some of their host microbe’s genes, leading the team to dub them ‘Borgs’ after the Star Trek villain that assimilate the biology and knowledge of other organisms. Nineteen distinct Borgs […]