There are strong images – both admiration and irritation – associated with the popularisation of vegetarianism and the use of meat substitutes. Marketing researchers from the University of Vaasa, Finland, have studied attitudes towards vegetarianism and why meat substitutes still do not make it off the shelf and into the shopping basket. Their research shows that meat alternative consumers elicit not only admiration but also envy, fear, contempt, and anger in others.

A research project led by Prof. Wei Wang from Harbin Institute of Technology (Shenzhen) and Dr. Xi Chen from Chengdu University of Technology has introduced a novel strategy for constructing active colloidal assemblies. This work, published in Research (2024, 7, 0490; DOI: 10.34133/research.0490), provides fresh insights into the design of smart materials with real-time, on-demand reconfiguration.

The Nano Materials Research Division at the Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS), led by Dr. Tae-Hoon Kim and Dr. Jung-Goo Lee, has successfully developed a groundbreaking grain boundary diffusion process that enables the fabrication of high-performance permanent magnets without the use of expensive heavy rare earth elements. This pioneering technology, marks the world’s first achievement in this field.