A new chemical strategy offers precision control in water treatment by producing hydroxyl radicals (•OH) only within a specific pH range.

Freshwater under the Ocean – in the 1960's scientists were quite surprised when they looked at their data: it clearly showed that there was fresh or freshened water under the ocean floor. How did it get there? How long has it been there? Scientists have been trying to find answers to these questions since their intriguing discovery. The findings will be relevant for the hydrogeology of the New England Shelf and for multiple similar settings elsewhere around the world. Starting in May, an international team of scientists has embarked on an expedition to take a closer look at, and take samples, of this freshened water stored beneath the ocean floor. Prof Karen Johannesson of University of Massachusetts Boston and Prof Brandon Dugan of Colorado School of Mines are the Co-Chief Scientists of this international expedition. Samples will be collected using the Liftboat Robert, which departed from the port of Bridgeport on May 19.

Links and knots are exotic topological structures that have garnered significant interest across multiple branches of natural sciences. Recently, scientists in China proposed a novel concept of incoherent links and knots – stable topological configurations persisting in fluctuating speckled light fields. Unlike phase or polarization links/knots in coherent light, incoherent links/knots originate from correlation properties of incoherent light fields. This work opens a new avenue for applications ranging from statistically engineered light manipulation to turbulence-resistant optical encryption systems.

A recent experimental breakthrough by researchers at Ningbo University and the University of Science and Technology of China extends Wheeler's delayed-choice experiment by enabling quantum control over both beam splitters in an interferometer. The results reveal richer manifestations of wave-particle duality, offering novel insights into quantum measurement, causality, and the temporal order of observation in quantum mechanics.

The electromagnetic responses of metamaterial microstructural units are typically described using classical polarization theory models from dielectric physics, such as the Lorentz and Drude models. However, there has been a notable absence of the Debye model, which holds significant importance in dielectric physics. Chinese scientists have now successfully uncovered a novel broadband electromagnetic response mechanism in metamaterial microstructures based on polarization theory - Debye relaxation.

New international research from Tulane University and published in Nature Geoscience is the first study to demonstrate global-scale patterns in how El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) influences mangrove growth and degradation. Previously, impacts had only been documented at individual sites, such as a dramatic die-off in northern Australia in 2015 when more than 40 million mangrove trees perished along a 1,200-mile stretch of coastline. 

A resounding victory for the University of Oldenburg, Germany: all three top-level research projects that submitted proposals to be Clusters of Excellence in the Excellence Strategy of the German federal and state governments have been approved and will receive funding for seven years. The topics of the Clusters are hearing research, animal navigation and marine sciences.