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Using neutrons, TU/e scientists visualize the internal processes of a redox flow battery. At the beginning of the 20th century, the invention of X-ray imaging provided a leap of knowledge in medical science. Since then, we can see how our body's bones work, bringing numerous new treatments to light. Now, a similar approach using neutron imaging makes it possible to visualize the internal functioning of redox flow batteries - a type of battery mainly used for large-scale storage in solar and wind energy systems.

A team of scientists from the University of Manchester has achieved a significant breakthrough in understanding lithium-ion storage within the thinnest possible battery anode - composed of just two layers of carbon atoms. Their research, published in Nature Communications , shows an unexpected 'in-plane staging' process during lithium intercalation in bilayer graphene, which could pave the way for advancements in energy storage technologies.

Researchers create a one-dimensional gas out of light Researchers create a one-dimensional gas out of light Joint experiment by the University of Bonn and the University of Kaiserslautern-Landau Physicists at the University of Bonn and the University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU) have created a one-dimensional gas out of light.

Gravitational waves are ripples in spacetime. The phenomenon can be compared to ripples on a sheet when a heavy ball is placed on it and spun around. In the universe, these "balls" are massive objects such as black holes and neutron stars, which vibrate spacetime as they orbit and eventually merge. These gravitational waves are emitted through space and, although very subtle, can be detected on Earth with the correct equipment.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have managed to make sound waves travel only in one direction. In the future, this method could also be used in technical applications with electromagnetic waves. Be it water, light or sound: waves usually propagate in the same way forwards as in the backward direction. As a consequence, when we are speaking to someone standing some distance away from us, that person can hear us as well as we can hear them.

Physicists capture images of ultracold atoms flowing freely, without friction, in an exotic "edge state." Typically, electrons are free agents that can move through most metals in any direction. When they encounter an obstacle, the charged particles experience friction and scatter randomly like colliding billiard balls.

A scintillating aerogel enabling real-time measurements with excellent sensitivity to certain radioactive gases, essential to monitoring the proper functioning of nuclear power plants, has just been developed by a group of physicists, chemists, and metrologists from the CNRS, the University Claude Bernard Lyon 1, the CEA, and the ENS de Lyon.

Atomic clocks have been used for decades - but now, even greater precision has become possible: TU Wien (Vienna) and JILA/NIST are presenting the world's first nuclear clock. For many years, scientists all'around the world have been working towards this goal, now suddenly things are happening very fast: it was only in April that a team led by Prof Thorsten Schumm (TU Wien, Vienna) announced a major success.

Lightwave electronics aim to integrate optical and electronic systems at incredibly high speeds, leveraging the ultrafast oscillations of light fields. Imagine how a phone call works: Your voice is converted into electronic signals, shifted up to higher frequencies, transmitted over long distances, and then shifted back down so it can be heard clearly on the other end.

An international team of researchers led by Maximilian Weißflog, with the participation of researchers from Jena, Canberra and with support from Darmstadt, has made a significant advance in quantum optics. In their latest publication in the renowned journal "Nature", the team presents a novel method for generating entangled photon pairs using two-dimensional (2D) materials.

Researchers create an "imprint" on a super photon Researchers create an "imprint" on a super photon A method developed at the University of Bonn could have potential applications for tap-proof communication Thousands of light particles can merge into a type of "super photon" under certain conditions.

Johns Hopkins team uses X-ray technology to observe what occurs when the top layer of an asteroid-like object is hit with extreme external force Johns Hopkins engineers have uncovered new details about how granular materials such as sand and rock behave under extreme impacts-findings that could someday help protect the Earth from dangerous asteroids.

Here's a batch of fresh news and announcements from across Imperial. From brain fluid surgery to a lunar-Earth flyby from the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE), here is some quick-read news from across Imperial. Spacecraft slingshot success The European Space Agency (ESA) Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE), with Imperial kit on board , has successfully completed a world-first lunar-Earth flyby.

Artificial photosynthesis could one day harness energy from the sun to convert carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and water into liquid fuels to power your car, and enable a process for creating chemicals and fertilizers that is better for the environment. But scientists first need new techniques to efficiently convert sunlight into solar fuels and chemicals at scale, and store them for later use.

Science + Technology Radiation from dark matter may have kept hydrogen gas hot enough to condense into black holes Key takeaways Supermassive black holes typically take billions of years to form. But the James Webb Space Telescope is finding them not that long after the Big Bang - before they should have had time to form.

In six new rogue worlds, Webb telescope finds more star birth clues Survey of young star-forming cluster a thousand light-years away offers evidence that the same cosmic processes that give birth to stars may also play a common role in making objects only slightly bigger than Jupiter The James Webb Space Telescope has spotted six likely rogue worlds-objects with planetlike masses but untethered from any star's gravity-including the lightest ever identified with a dusty disk around it.

New results from the world's most sensitive dark matter detector narrow down the possibilities for what makes up our universe's invisible mass. Figuring out the nature of dark matter, the invisible substance that makes up most of the mass in our universe, is one of the greatest puzzles in physics. New results from the world's most sensitive dark matter detector, LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ), have put new limits on the potential properties of one of the leading dark matter candidates: weakly interacting massive particles, or WIMPs.

Key Takeaways With 280 days of data, the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) collaboration has made a world-leading search for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) in areas no experiment has probed before. The new result is nearly five times better than the previous world's best published result and finds no evidence of WIMPs above a mass of 9 GeV/c2.

Superconductivity theory proposed by Würzburg physics team validated in international experiment: Cooper pairs display wave-like distribution in Kagome metals, enabling new technological applications like superconducting diodes. For about fifteen years, Kagome materials with their star-shaped structure reminiscent of a Japanese basketry pattern have captivated global research.

New research using neural networks, a form of brain-inspired AI, proposes a solution to the tough challenge of modelling the states of molecules. The research shows how the technique can help solve fundamental equations in complex molecular systems. This could lead to practical uses in the future, helping researchers to prototype new materials and chemical syntheses using computer simulation before trying to make them in the lab.