Engineering news
Robotics
Robots that keep moving when flipped? Sea star tube feet offer a blueprint
Ever feel run off your feet? Spare a thought for sea stars, creatures whose movement involves the coordination of hundreds of tiny tube feet to navigate complex environments—despite the lack of a central "brain."
32 minutes ago
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Engineering
City skylines need an upgrade in the face of climate stress
When structural engineers design a building, they aren't just stacking floors; they are calculating how to win a complex battle against nature. Every building is built to withstand a specific "budget" of environmental stress—the ...
2 minutes ago
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Stabilized iron catalyst could replace platinum in hydrogen fuel cells
Japan and California have embraced hydrogen fuel-cell technologies, a form of renewable energy that can be used in vehicles and for supplying clean energy to manufacturing sectors. But the technology remains expensive due ...
19 hours ago
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Researchers successfully 3D print one of industry's hardest engineering materials
Tungsten carbide–cobalt (WC–Co) is prized for its hardness, but that same property makes it unusually difficult to shape. The current process is wasteful and expensive for the yield produced, and an economically sensible ...
23 hours ago
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Interface engineering lifts perovskite solar cell performance to 26.19% efficiency
Researchers from the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology (QIBEBT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in collaboration with international partners, have engineered a thin two-dimensional perovskite phase ...
20 hours ago
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Engineering
Near-perfect bonding between key fusion reactor materials achieved
A research team led by Prof. Huang Qunying from the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and the Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science has achieved nearly defect-free ...
23 hours ago
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Engineering
'I'm walking here!' A new model maps foot traffic in New York
Early in the 1969 film "Midnight Cowboy," Dustin Hoffman, playing the character of Ratso Rizzo, crosses a Manhattan street and angrily bangs on the hood of an encroaching taxi. Hoffman's line, "I'm walking here!" has since ...
Feb 6, 2026
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Engineering
GeSn alloys emerge as a new semiconductor class that could reshape optoelectronics
Scientists have created a new type of material that could enable common electronic devices to work faster and use less energy, a study suggests. The findings indicate the material, which was until now thought near-impossible ...
Feb 5, 2026
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Engineering
Batteries from rust? Carbon spheres filled with iron oxide deliver high storage capacity
Conventional lithium-ion batteries contain problematic substances such as nickel and cobalt, and the solvents used to coat the electrode materials are also toxic. Materials scientists at Saarland University are therefore ...
Feb 5, 2026
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Engineering
Why light poles failed in Hurricane Ian despite meeting design standards
When Hurricane Ian moved across Florida in 2022, several aluminum light poles on a Central Florida bridge collapsed or cracked, even though wind speeds remained below the structures' design limits. A new University of Florida ...
Feb 5, 2026
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Engineering
Origami-inspired waveguides fold for launch, expand in space for satellites
High-powered satellites use electromagnetic waveguides to deliver energy from one component to another. Typically, they are made of heavy, inflexible metal tubes with an even heavier flange on either end, neither of which ...
Feb 5, 2026
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Engineering
AI-powered solar aquaculture reveals a scalable pathway for food, energy and climate action
Researchers in Taiwan demonstrate that installing solar panels above clam ponds can simultaneously support aquaculture and renewable energy under increasing climate stress. Using real-world farm data, the study shows that ...
Feb 5, 2026
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Engineering
New design tool 3D-prints woven metamaterials that stretch and fail predictably
Metamaterials—materials whose properties are primarily dictated by their internal microstructure, and not their chemical makeup—have been redefining the engineering materials space for the last decade. To date, however, ...
Feb 4, 2026
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Robotics
A programmable, Lego-like material for robots emulates life's flexibility
Mechanical engineers at Duke University have demonstrated a proof-of-concept method for programming mechanical properties into solid Lego-like building blocks. By controlling the solidity of hundreds of individual cells in ...
Feb 3, 2026
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Engineering
Your future home might be framed with printed plastic
The plastic bottle you just tossed in the recycling bin could provide structural support for your future house. MIT engineers are using recycled plastic to 3D print construction-grade beams, trusses, and other structural ...
Feb 3, 2026
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Engineering
Octopus-inspired 'smart skin' uses 4D printing to morph on cue
Despite the prevalence of synthetic materials across different industries and scientific fields, most are developed to serve a limited set of functions. To address this inflexibility, researchers at Penn State, led by Hongtao ...
Feb 3, 2026
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Engineering
Novel approach to a key biofuel production step captures an elusive energy source
Plants grown for biofuel have the potential to power our travel industry, but an important fraction of their chemical power has remained stubbornly difficult to recover. New research from the Center for Advanced Biofuel and ...
Feb 3, 2026
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Engineering
Metamaterial insights point to better implants, robot hands and bumpers
Metamaterials are composites with a very precisely controlled structure. It is this structure that determines the properties of the metamaterial, not the substances it is made of. Typically, a metamaterial consists of repeating ...
Feb 3, 2026
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Engineering
Building with air: How nature's hole-filled blueprints shape manufacturing
If you break open a chicken bone, you won't find a solid mass of white material inside. Instead, you will see a complex, spongelike network of tiny struts and pillars, and a lot of empty space.
Feb 3, 2026
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Robotics
A mathematical framework for optimizing robotic joints
Consider the marvelous physics of the human knee. The largest hinge joint in the body, it has two rounded bones held together by ligaments that not only swing like a door, but also roll and glide over each other, allowing ...
Feb 2, 2026
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Engineering
Transparent windows can shield buildings from powerful electromagnetic pulses
Electromagnetic pulses (EMPs)—high-energy-density and ultra-wideband beams of electromagnetic radiation—are generated from sources such as nuclear explosions, high-power electromagnetic pulse devices, and intentional ...
Feb 2, 2026
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Engineering
New steel processing technique extends EV range without increasing battery capacity
A research team affiliated with UNIST unveiled a new steel manufacturing process that can improve the driving distance of electric vehicles (EVs) without the need for larger batteries. This technology offers a promising way ...
Feb 2, 2026
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Engineering
Multi-layer flax fiber fabric developed for alternative seating furniture with flexible geometries
Seating furniture is frequently not designed for long-term use or simple assembly and disassembly and has a tendency to break after just one move. This does not apply to the benches, chairs, and stools that were created as ...
Feb 2, 2026
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Engineering
Mechanical engineers' wood-based material could cut energy costs
University of Texas at Dallas researchers and their collaborators have developed and patented a wood-based material that can store and discharge heat to help make building temperatures more comfortable without using electricity. ...
Feb 2, 2026
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Robotics
Quickly and precisely localizing radioactive material with drones and robots
Chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive substances (CBRNE substances for short) can pose a threat to the public and to emergency services. For example, in 2023, a cesium capsule measuring just a few millimeters ...
Feb 2, 2026
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