Ozone pollution is a global environmental concern that not only threatens human health and crop production, but also worsens global warming. While the formation of ozone is often attributed to anthropogenic pollutants, soil emissions are revealed to be another important source. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) researchers have examined global soil nitrous acid (HONO) emissions data from 1980 to 2016 and incorporated them in a chemistry-climate model to unveil the pivotal role soil HONO emissions play in the increase of the ozone mixing ratio in air and its negative impact on vegetation.

While scientists have long studied currents of large eddies, the smaller ones — called submesoscale eddies — are notoriously difficult to detect. These currents, which range from several kilometers to 100 kilometers wide, have been the “missing pieces” of the ocean’s puzzle — until now. Using data from the new Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) satellite, a Texas A&M researcher and his collaborators at JPL, CNES and Caltech finally got a clear view of these hard-to-see currents, and they are a lot stronger than anyone thought.

Understanding the fundamental energy configuration of thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) materials, the key material that make OLEDs, is critical in developing new more advanced OLEDs. However, current analytical methods have been occasionally unreliable due to its inherent subjectivity and conditional assumptions. Now, researchers have developed a new analytical model that details the kinetics and state dynamics of excitons in TADF materials.

A world team including Vrije Universiteit Brussel, VISTEC from Thailand, Universidad de Zaragoza and Universitat de Girona presents a computational framework for the organocatalytic cycloaddition of CO₂ to epoxides to form cyclic carbonates, key for the polymer industry. It identifies the rate-determining step and highlights the buried volume of epoxide oxygen as a key factor. Results align with experiments and support rational catalyst design beyond ascorbic acid, promoting predictive catalysis for efficient CO₂ utilization by machine learning tools. Their work was published in the journal Industrial Chemistry & Materials in May 2025.

Millions suffer from xerostomia, or dry mouth—a painful condition often caused by cancer treatments or autoimmune disease.

Seoul National University College of Engineering has announced that a joint research team led by Professor Hyobin Yoo from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, in collaboration with Professor Young-Woo Son (Korea Institute for Advanced Study) and Professor Changwon Park (Ewha Womans University), has successfully developed a two-dimensional (2D) quantum material platform through the superposition of moiré lattices. The research was published online on May 14 in Nature, the most prestigious journal in science and technology, under the title “Unconventional domain tessellations in moiré-of-moiré lattices.” The study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea’s Young Researcher Program and SRC program, the POSCO Science Fellowship from the POSCO TJ Park Foundation, and the Korea Institute for Advanced Study. This study marks the first atomic-level identification of hierarchical structures and complex interlayer interactions resulting from the superposition of different moiré lattices in a trilayer graphene system. The work is expected to offer a promising new solid-state platform for the development of programmable quantum devices and next-generation electronic materials.

Discontinuous Deformation Analysis (DDA), a powerful tool for simulating the mechanical behavior of rock masses and discontinuous systems, has seen remarkable progress in recent 40 years. This article reviews DDA's evolution and explores how its integration with artificial intelligence (AI) could enhance simulation accuracy and computational efficiency.