A physicist at the University of Cincinnati and his colleagues figured out something two of America’s most famous fictional physicists couldn’t: theoretically how to produce subatomic particles called axions in fusion reactors.

New research, enabled by the NSF Center for Chemical Innovation on MXenes Synthesis, Tunability and Reactivity (M-STAR) and recently published in Nature Synthesis, used chemical vapor deposition to create the two-dimensional materials called MXenes that are “at least two orders of magnitude” less expensive than MXenes synthesized by traditional methods. The inspiration for this groundbreaking way to synthesize these futuristic materials came from a long-forgotten, 40-year-old exploratory paper by a chemistry legend.

Faster, more efficient, and more versatile – these are the expectations for the technology that will produce our energy and handle information in the future. But how can these expectations be met? A major breakthrough in physics has now been made by an international team of researchers from the Universities of Göttingen, Marburg, the Berlin Humboldt in Germany, and Graz in Austria. The scientists combined two highly promising types of material – organic semiconductors and two-dimensional semiconductors – and studied their combined response to light using photoelectron spectroscopy and many-body perturbation theory. This enabled them to observe and describe fundamental microscopic processes, such as energy transfer, at the 2D-organic interface with ultrafast time resolution, meaning one quadrillionth of a second. The combination of these properties holds promise for developing new technology such as the next generation of solar cells. The results were published in Nature Physics.

Water accumulated in the tanks of these plants living high up in trees has much higher concentrations of nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium, potassium, magnesium, sulfur, and iron than rainwater. Plants irrigated with this nutrient-rich water produced almost twice as many leaves.

New findings about ocean processes in the Antarctic show melting ice shelves and changes to sea ice could have catastrophic implications for the global climate.

18 December 2025 / Kiel / Plymouth. The ocean may have absorbed significantly more carbon dioxide (CO₂) than previously calculated. A new study by the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel and the Plymouth Marine Laboratory shows that the exchange of gases between air and sea is not symmetric, and that the global ocean has taken up around 15 per cent more CO₂ than suggested by conventional estimates. In windy regions, air bubbles entrained by breaking waves substantially enhance the uptake of CO₂. The results are based on extensive direct measurements from the ocean and have now been published in the journal Nature Communications.

Elements from the group of rare earth metals are of great importance today, also in technical applications. The Bioinorganic Chemistry group at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) is conducting diverse research into these elements. The group has now published two studies in the scientific journal Angewandte Chemie (“Applied Chemistry”). One examines peptides, which can bind these elements, while the other highlights the potential role of the elements in the origins of life.