In “The Miraculous from the Material,” MIT professor of the practice Alan Lightman offers 35 essays about scientific understanding, each corresponding to photos of spectacular natural phenomena, from spider webs to sunsets and from galaxies to hummingbirds.

Asking children “What does a scientist look like?” now results in more illustrations of women and people of color than decades ago. But do generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools also depict the diversity among scientists? Researchers reporting in the Journal of Chemical Education prompted AI image generators for portraits of chemists. They found that none of the collections accurately represents the gender, racial or disability diversity among real chemists today.

Researchers at Colorado State University have found a new approach for breaking down PFAS – a group of human-made “forever” chemicals commonly used for their water-resistant properties that can carry health risks from long-term exposure. In a paper published today in Nature, CSU researchers showcase an effective LED light-based photocatalytic system that can be used at room temperature to break down those key carbon-fluorine bonds. The system is an improvement over traditional chemical manufacturing processes that typically require high temperatures to achieve similar results.  

The pipe organ stands as a bastion in concert halls and church sanctuaries, and even when not in use, it affects the acoustical environment around it. Researchers performed a sine-sweep through loudspeakers facing the organ pipes and measured the response with a microphone at different positions. They verified experimentally that sympathetic resonance does occur in organ pipes during musical performances and speeches, and that the overall amplitude increases when the signal matches the resonance of one or more pipes. They will present their data Wednesday, Nov. 20, at the 187th ASA Meeting.

Research by Lixian Guo at the University of Canterbury may make it possible to keep electronic devices powered with another piece of equipment you’re likely to bring with you while exploring the great outdoors: camping stoves. Guo’s work focuses on using the excess heat produced by stoves to create a thermoacoustic engine, which converts thermal energy into acoustic energy. This acoustic energy can then be transformed into mechanical or electrical energy. When optimized, these engines can generate power ranging from tens to thousands of watts, depending on their size.