A simple 'twist' improves the engine of clean fuel generation
Researchers have found a way to super-charge the 'engine' of sustainable fuel generation—by giving the materials a little twist.
22 hours ago
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Researchers have found a way to super-charge the 'engine' of sustainable fuel generation—by giving the materials a little twist.
22 hours ago
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37
Researchers from Skoltech and their colleagues have improved the properties of a carbon-based electrode material by exposing it to air plasma. Such treatment turned out to enhance electrode performance, which is the limiting ...
Apr 22, 2024
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Oxide ion conductors used in solid-state fuel cells often fail to reach full potential when operating at temperatures below 500 oC, but researchers from Tokyo Tech have recently found a solution to this problem. They demonstrated ...
Apr 10, 2024
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Two-dimensional (2D) superconducting materials have been found to be promising for the development of miniaturized optoelectronic devices. To perform well while consuming less energy, however, these smaller devices require ...
A research team led by Prof. Kwon Hyuk-jun of the DGIST Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science has developed a next-generation AI semiconductor technology that mimics the human brain's efficiency in AI ...
Mar 29, 2024
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Flexible solar cells have many potential applications in aerospace and flexible electronics, but low energy conversion efficiency has limited their practical use. A new manufacturing method has increased the power efficiency ...
Mar 27, 2024
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A research team led by Prof. Meng Guowen and Prof. Han Fangming from the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, together with Prof. Wei Bingqing from the University of Delaware, miniaturized ...
Mar 19, 2024
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Lithium-ion batteries are widely used in various applications but need improved binders to enhance their performance to meet evolving demands. This is because silicon oxide (SiO), a promising anode material due to its high ...
Mar 1, 2024
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Our recent article published in Nature Energy relates our first attempt at the development of a scalable photoelectrochemical (PEC) system to produce green hydrogen.
Sodium-ion batteries still have a number of weaknesses that could be remedied by optimizing the battery materials. One possibility is to dope the cathode material with foreign elements. A team from HZB and Humboldt-Universität ...
Feb 21, 2024
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An oxide ( /ˈɒksaɪd/) is a chemical compound that contains at least one oxygen atom in its chemical formula. Metal oxides typically contain an anion of oxygen in the oxidation state of −2.
Most of the Earth's crust consists of solid oxides. Oxides result when elements are oxidized by oxygen in air. Combustion of hydrocarbons affords the two principal oxides of carbon, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide. Even materials that are considered to be pure elements often contain a coating of oxides. For example, aluminium foil has a thin skin of Al2O3 that protects the foil from further corrosion.
Virtually all elements burn in an atmosphere of oxygen, or an oxygen rich environment. In the presence of water and oxygen (or simply air), some elements—lithium, sodium, potassium, rubidium, caesium, strontium and barium—react rapidly, even dangerously, to give the hydroxides. In part for this reason, alkali and alkaline earth metals are not found in nature in their metallic, i.e., native, form. Caesium is so reactive with oxygen that it is used as a getter in vacuum tubes, and solutions of potassium and sodium, so called NaK are used to deoxygenate and dehydrate some organic solvents. The surface of most metals consists of oxides and hydroxides in the presence of air. A well known example is aluminium foil, which is coated with a thin film of aluminium oxide that passivates the metal, slowing further corrosion. The aluminium oxide layer can be built to greater thickness by the process of electrolytic anodising. Although solid magnesium and aluminium react slowly with oxygen at STP, they, like most metals, will burn in air, generating very high temperatures. Finely grained powders of most metals can be dangerously explosive in air. Consequently, they are often used in Solid-fuel rockets.
In dry oxygen, iron readily forms iron(II) oxide, but the formation of the hydrated ferric oxides, Fe2O3−2x(OH)x, that mainly comprise rust, typically requires oxygen and water. The production of free oxygen by photosynthetic bacteria some 3.5 billion years ago precipitated iron out of solution in the oceans as Fe2O3 in the economically important iron ore hematite.
Due to its electronegativity, oxygen forms chemical bonds with almost all elements to give the corresponding oxides. Noble metals (such as gold or platinum) resist direct chemical combination with oxygen, and substances like gold(III) oxide must be generated by indirect routes.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA