This review examines how indigenous water-harvesting systems have helped dryland communities manage scarce water for centuries. It shows that many are now declining due to groundwater pumping, migration, climate change, policy shifts, weak maintenance, urbanization and natural disasters. The authors argue that revitalizing these systems can improve water access, agriculture, livestock production, groundwater recharge and flood control, while preserving traditional knowledge. Combined with appropriate modern technologies and supportive policies, these systems can strengthen water resilience in arid and semi-arid regions.

Clean hydrogen production depends on catalysts that can split water efficiently while using precious metals more wisely. A new catalyst design addresses one of the long-standing barriers in alkaline water electrolysis: the slow breakdown of water molecules on platinum (Pt) surfaces. By placing Pt clusters on a symbiotic oxide support made from titanium dioxide quantum dots and cobalt oxide (TiO₂ QDs/Co₃O₄), the study reshapes the electronic state of Pt and creates paired active sites. These sites separately accelerate water dissociation and hydrogen adsorption, enabling faster hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) activity, stronger stability, and a clearer path toward more efficient alkaline electrolyzers.

New PNAS study finds atmospheric feedbacks cancel over half of vegetation's expected water-saving benefit

Recently, Professor Hanjun Sun and his team from Nanjing Normal University proposed a novel C_sp–π–d conjugation design strategy. By incorporating carbon–carbon triple bonds (C≡C) into a metalloporphyrin framework, they constructed a C_sp–π–d conjugated structure with unique electronic modulation capability, enabling precise regulation of the adsorption behavior of the key oxygen reduction intermediate *OH and thereby significantly enhancing the performance of non-precious-metal catalysts. The resulting p-Co-TEPP/rGO catalyst not only exhibited outstanding oxygen reduction activity in alkaline media, but also delivered superior overall performance to the Pt/C–RuO₂ cathode in zinc–air batteries, offering a new strategy for the design of low-cost, high-performance energy catalysts.