Paper packaging is a sustainable alternative to plastic. However, as it is permeable to air, food packaged in paper loses its flavour over time, and undesirable substances such as solvents can penetrate the packaging. Up to now, extensive tests were necessary for each type of paper to determine to what extent and how quickly this happens. A research team led by Karin Zojer from the Institute of Solid State Physics at Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) has now developed an AI-based prediction system that calculates how permeable different types of paper are to volatile organic substances. This significantly speeds up the development of new packaging materials. The prediction tool, which was developed as part of the CD Laboratory for Mass Transport through Paper, is already being used by a paper manufacturer.

Thin-walled parts are vital in aerospace and high-performance manufacturing, but their weak stiffness makes them prone to damaging vibrations during milling.

A new review highlights the latest strategies for suppressing chatter vibrations, including passive, active, and semi-active techniques. It brings together progress from materials science, mechanical engineering, control systems, and digital manufacturing, while also outlining what is still needed to achieve stable, efficient, and high-quality machining in real industrial settings.

Sustainable city management recognises the importance of not only the busy above-ground urban systems but also the invisible underground infrastructure, utilities, and hidden heritage and their stories. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) is at the fore-front of geospatial and near-surface geophysical technologies, advancing land surveying research that supports cultural preservation and the sustainable development urban environment.

The research team led by Dr. Jang SeGyu at the Functional Composite Materials Research Center of the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST, President Oh Sang-rok) and the research team led by Professor Choi Siyoung at the Department of Bio and Chemical Engineering of the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST, President Lee Kwang-hyung) announced the development of a high-density BNNT protective shield. This shield, created by densely-packed BNNTs, is robust, efficiently conducts heat, and effectively blocks cosmic radiation.

Researchers from Zhengzhou University have released the most comprehensive review to date on the rapidly expanding field of element doped biochar. The study explains how simple biowaste can be transformed into powerful engineered materials with exceptional performance in pollution control, energy storage, soil improvement and industrial catalysis. The findings highlight the growing importance of advanced carbon materials in global efforts to address environmental and energy related challenges.

Low earth orbit (LEO) mega-constellations, characterized by dense satellite coverage and low transmission latency, have substantial advantages in global communications, earth observation, and disaster forecasting. Compared to traditional constellations with simple configurations, mega-constellations have a large number of nodes and complex satellite interaction relationships and are oriented to vast global missions. As a result, when the traditional ground-based centralized management mode is applied to a mega-constellation, the ground station suffers from an explosive growth of control load and struggles to achieve the efficient, timely, and orderly operation of the mega-constellation. Therefore, it is necessary to adjust the management architecture to partially transfer the on-ground management mission to on-board management mission. Clustering satellites into multiple management domains and implementing unified management within each domain is an effective method for realizing on-board management of mega-constellations. Existing studies on the construction of satellite management domains have focused on some specific indicators, such as spatial distribution uniformity, network control latency, and controller load. Considering the highly dynamic motion of the mega-constellation, a fixed management domain construction will inevitably lead to frequent updates of the management architecture, thereby increasing the burden of on-board management. Thus, more stable strategies for constructing and updating the management domain need to be explored to reduce the frequency of management architecture updates over extended mission periods.