Governments around the world – led by the US – are moving to restrict and control academic collaborations with China. What will this mean for research groups and universities on both sides? The latest in the clampdown on links with China is the closure of two major research centres involving Imperial College London and Chinese […]

Mallinckrodt, former owner of a long-defunct chlor-alkali plant on the Penobscot River in Maine, US, will have to pay at least $187 million (£167 million), and up to $267 million, for mercury remediation under a settlement approved by a federal district court judge on 11 October. The agreement resolves litigation begun in 2000, when the […]

Researchers in Japan have developed a way to count the charge on a single nanoparticle. The technique is accurate down to a single electron, and could offer new insights into fundamental aspects of heterogeneous catalysis. Many heterogeneous catalysts are composed of metal nanoparticles supported on a metal oxide surface. But interactions between the particle and […]

The world’s largest carbon capture and storage plant is expected to be operational by late next year, launched by the US climate tech companies CarbonCapture in California and Frontier Carbon Solutions. The companies anticipate that the new facility in Wyoming will be able to remove 5 million tonnes of atmospheric carbon dioxide annually by 2030. […]

Indian generics firm Maiden Pharmaceuticals has been implicated in the deaths of 66 children in The Gambia, West Africa. On 5 October, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a special alert focusing on four substandard cough syrups: Promethazine oral solution, Kofexmalin Baby Cough Syrup, Makoff Baby Cough Syrup and Magrip N Cold Syrup, all manufactured […]

A new catalytic system has been developed that can unravel plastic polymer chains into small chemical fragments. These chemicals are usually obtained by industry from crude oil and this depolymerisation technology can turn used plastics into propylene to make new plastics. Polyethylene is cheap and strong making it ideal for packaging and single use products […]

Millions of litres of firefighting foam that contain high levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are sitting in stockpiles. Much of this leftover material has been there for decades, held in storage at fire stations, airports, oil facilities and chemical manufacturing plants across the US. Until now, there hasn’t been an acceptable method to […]

Using molecular design, researchers have developed a synthetic water oxidation catalyst with an enzyme-like cavity to speed up the reaction. This unusual catalytic system achieves the challenging oxidative water-splitting reaction at a comparable rate to the photosystems found in photosynthesis. Water oxidation is a key step in photosynthesis and involves splitting two water molecules into […]

The Indian government’s decision to scrap over 300 awards given annually to researchers across all scientific disciplines has stunned the country’s science community. Although the government has not made any formal announcement yet, the minutes of a meeting chaired by the Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on 16 September and attended by key officials from science […]

The abrupt firing of renowned chemist Maitland Jones by New York University (NYU) has set off a firestorm in higher education and the chemistry community. The university terminated his contract just before the start of the autumn term, after 82 of his 350 students signed a petition complaining that his organic chemistry class was too […]