In Physics of Fluids, researchers from the University of Strathclyde examine the properties of several dairy-free butter alternatives inside one of the region’s most well-known snacks: Scottish shortbread. The group tested the alternatives in their lab, selecting three types of vegan butter substitutes with different levels of fat and comparing their consistencies and responses to heat. The vegan alternative with the highest fat content behaved like butter when baked and yielded the most positive feedback in taste testing. Butter typically has a fat content around 80%, and the group recommends choosing a vegan butter with a similar consistency.

While hydrogen production technologies are gaining attraction for a sustainable energy transition, traditional water electrolysis is challenged by its high voltage requirements. To overcome this limitation, chemical water-assisted electrolysis is emerging as a promising alternative. This technology replaces the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) of traditional water electrolysis with various chemical oxidation reactions to produce hydrogen at lower voltages. In addition, it can generate high-value products or remove pollutants in the process, enabling simultaneous energy production and environmental improvement.

However, compared to the thermodynamic potential, the actual driving potential is still high due to overpotential problems. This review presents the latest catalyst design strategies aimed at addressing the high overpotential issues associated with five chemical water-assisted electrolysis reactions, including ammonia, alcohol, urea, hydrazine, and biomass. These strategies contribute to reducing overpotential while simultaneously enhancing long-term stability, demonstrating potential as a clean hydrogen production technology. This work was published on February 24, 2025, in Industrial Chemistry & Materials.

Imagine a world where batteries can repair themselves, extending their lifespan, improving safety, and making electronic devices more resilient. This once futuristic concept is now becoming a reality. Inspired by nature’s ability to heal wounds, self-healing batteries can autonomously recover from physical and chemical damage, making them particularly valuable for flexible electronics, wearable devices, and other high-stress applications. A recent review published in Energy Materials and Devices explores the cutting-edge progress in self-healing materials for battery components, shedding light on the challenges and opportunities in this emerging field.

Researchers have determined that six gas valves provide the best protection against plasma disruptions in SPARC, a next-generation, experimental fusion system. By refining the setup for the fusion vessel’s massive gas injection system, researchers are ensuring that disruptions — sudden jets of plasma that can damage the fusion vessel’s inner walls — are controlled efficiently, paving the way for safer, more robust fusion power plants.

To get around the constraints of quantum physics, EPFL researchers have built a new acoustic system to study the way the minuscule atoms of condensed matter talk together. They hope to one day build an acoustic version of a quantum computer.

Researchers have developed a novel ternary electrolyte system combining ionic liquids (ILs) with water-in-salt (WIS) technology, significantly enhancing the high-temperature stability and voltage capacity of aqueous potassium-ion supercapacitors. The optimized electrolyte achieves a record-breaking 3.37 V electrochemical window and maintains 87.6% capacitance after 2000 cycles at 60°C, offering a breakthrough for energy storage in electric vehicles and industrial applications.

Due to the inherent low atomic number of organic materials, their ability to absorb high-energy rays is relatively weak. Coupled with the low utilization rate of excited-state excitons, the radio-luminescence intensity of organic scintillators is generally lower than that of inorganic scintillators. Recently, the research team led by Professor Shuang-Quan Zang from Zhengzhou university innovatively utilized charge-separated (CS) state traps to capture high-energy carriers, significantly enhancing the radio-luminescence intensity of organic scintillators. The related paper was published in National Science Review.