Engineering news

Engineering

Safer all-solid-state sodium battery could cut grid storage costs and reduce lithium dependence

Lithium-ion batteries dominate the market for large-scale energy storage today. However, the element's uneven global distribution and rising costs are driving the search for alternatives. Sodium is roughly a thousand times ...

Engineering

Transparent oxide glass tops 130 GPa using conventional melt-quenching

Glass is a versatile material used in a wide range of applications, from light bulb casings to optical fibers. Recently, high-strength glass has become an important focus of materials research, as new technologies demand ...

Robotics

Robotic collective flows like matter, adapting without centralized control

Cornell engineers have developed a robotic collective that behaves less like a machine and more like a material that flows, reshapes, and adapts to its environment without centralized control. The system, called the Cross-Link ...

Engineering

These brick walls are built to come apart, move, and rise again after demolition

The construction sector still has some way to go in terms of reducing the consumption of resources and greenhouse gas emissions. One of these relates to the construction waste produced during the demolition of buildings. ...

Engineering

Custom device maps carbon capture reactions in real time

Removing carbon dioxide (CO2) directly from the air, a process called direct air capture (or DAC), is one of several approaches being developed to help reduce the concentration of this greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. Among ...

Engineering

Building the future with robotic construction

On April 24, the Architectural Robotic Construction Lab ( ARC Lab) in The University of Texas at Arlington's College of Architecture, Planning and Public Affairs demonstrated its new large-scale 3D printing technology.

Engineering

Basalt could be the key to greener and cheaper cement

Ideas to reduce carbon emissions often revolve around renewable power, electric vehicles and energy efficiency. But there's another, less colorful character that's often overlooked: cement.

Engineering

New research enables safe reuse of concrete

Recent research in Sweden and Finland shows how used concrete's lifespan can be extended another 50 to 100 years when incorporated into new construction. A team from KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Tampere University ...

Engineering

Can desert sand be used to build houses and roads?

The world may be running out of sand suitable for concrete. Researchers are therefore testing a possible solution for using desert sand as a material. Ren Wei and several researchers at NTNU and the University of Tokyo have ...

Engineering

Ultrahigh solid loading enables high precision ceramic parts

National Taiwan University researchers have developed an ultrahigh-solid-loading (83 vol%) yet highly flowable suspension for 3D printing that produces ceramic parts with extremely low shrinkage and 100% density, overcoming ...

Engineering

Elastic metasurface can capture multiple frequencies at once

It has long been considered common sense that a single device performs only one function. Just as tuning a radio to a different frequency changes the channel, systems that manipulate waves have traditionally been designed ...

Engineering

Origami-inspired ring lets users 'feel' virtual worlds

Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are technologies that allow users to immerse themselves in digital worlds or enhance their surroundings with computer-generated filters or images, respectively. Both these technologies ...