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Category: chemistry

Anaerobic digestion of poultry droppings for biogas production: a pilot study of renewable energy technology in the agricultural sector

Proper management of agricultural waste is challenging due to diverse sources, high production volumes, seasonal fluctuations, limited technical knowledge, and insufficient funding. These challenges often lead to soil degradation, environmental pollution, and adverse effects on ecosystems and human health. This study aims to investigate biogas production from poultry droppings using Continuous Stirred Tank Reactor (CSTR) Anaerobic Digestion (AD) technology to promote green energy use and as a sustainable solution for agricultural waste management.

Dried poultry manure samples were collected from two poultry farms in Lafia city and from their manure disposal sources. The samples were thoroughly stirred to ensure homogeneity and digested at a mesophilic temperature of 28.0 °C. With an initial solid concentration of 20.0%, the manure was diluted with water at 1:2 ratio to produce an input slurry containing 12.0% total volatile solids by weight. The experiment was conducted from July 20 to September 10, 2025. Parameters including pH, alkalinity, temperature, and biogas flow rate were monitored daily. Chemical and physical analyses of total solids, total volatile solids, and chemical oxygen demand were conducted during startup using three biological replicates (n = 3), with results expressed using statistical tool of mean ± standard error. Volatile fatty acids and alkalinity were measured using the distillation method.

Atomic-level snapshots reveal how a key copper enzyme powers nature’s chemistry

Researchers from the University of Liverpool, Japan, and Argentina have captured atomic-resolution images of an important copper-containing enzyme using advanced X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) technology at SACLA in Japan. XFEL technology generates ultra-bright, ultra-short X-ray pulses, enabling atomic-scale imaging and real-time observation of chemical, biological, and physical processes.

The international team—led by Dr. Svetlana Antonyuk and Professor Samar Hasnain at the University of Liverpool, Professor Takehiko Tosha at the University of Hyogo, and Dr. Masaki Yamamoto at RIKEN SPring-8—studied a protein that plays a key role in the global nitrogen cycle. This protein converts nitrite, an essential nitrogen intermediate, into nitric oxide gas.

The new details reveal how an enzyme called copper nitrite reductase (CuNiR) from three different organisms converts nitrite to nitric oxide gas, using an electron and a proton—a vital process for both biology and the environment.

AI accelerators deliver accurate models for challenging quantum chemistry calculations

The most demanding calculations in quantum chemistry can now be solved with graphics processing unit (GPU) supercomputers. A recently published study shows that software adapted to use GPU hardware can provide not just speed, but also the accuracy needed to solve complex chemistry problems. The work solved the two chemical structures often seen as too complex and expensive to tackle. The advance, published in the Journal of Chemical Theory and Computation, could allow researchers to make meaningful progress in designing new catalysts and improve predicted behaviors of magnetic and electronic materials.

Specifically, the research team—led by computational chemists from NVIDIA, Sandbox AQ, the Wigner Research Centre in Hungary, the Institute for Advanced Study of the Technical University of Munich in Germany, and the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory—showed that NVIDIA Blackwell architecture effectively tackles complex simulations. Here, the researchers used a mixture of mathematically precise and approximated approaches to accomplish their goal.

“Our study shows that AI-oriented hardware can do more than provide speed—it can also power chemically accurate, strongly correlated quantum chemistry at the frontier of what is computationally feasible,” said Sotiris Xantheas, a computational chemist at PNNL and study author. Xantheas also serves as the principal investigator of Scalable Predictive methods for Excitations and Correlated phenomena (SPEC), a Department of Energy initiative.

NASA Rover Uncovers Rare Organic Molecules on Mars

“We think we’re looking at organic matter that’s been preserved on Mars for 3.5 billion years,” said Dr. Amy Williams. [ https://www.labroots.com/trending/space/30462/nasa-rover-unc…les-mars-2](https://www.labroots.com/trending/space/30462/nasa-rover-unc…les-mars-2)

Does Mars contain the building blocks for life as we know it? This is what a recent study published in Nature Communications hopes to address as a team of researchers investigated whether the surface of Mars could preserve evidence for life as we know it using experiments from one of its rovers. This study has the potential to help scientists better understand how and where to search for past evidence of life as we know it and comes as NASA is working to return samples from the surface of Mars.

For the study, the researchers examined data obtained from NASA’s Curiosity rover, which has been exploring Gale Crater on Mars since 2012. Recently, it used its cache of scientific instruments to identify more than 20 organic molecules from 3.5-billion-year-old Martian clays. These included a first-time identification of DNA precursors and specific chemicals that are delivered to planets via meteorites.

Why does life prefer one ‘hand’ over the other? New study points to electron spin

A team of scientists has identified a new physical mechanism that could help explain one of the most persistent mysteries in science: why life consistently uses one “handed” version of its molecules and not the other. In a new study led by Prof. Yossi Paltiel of the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology at Hebrew University and Prof. Ron Naaman of the Weizmann Institute, researchers show that electron spin, a fundamental quantum property, can cause mirror-image molecules to behave differently during dynamic processes, even though they are otherwise identical. The work appears in Science Advances.

Many molecules essential to life come in two mirror-image forms, known as enantiomers. Chemically, these forms are nearly indistinguishable. Yet in living systems, only one version is typically used: amino acids are almost exclusively one type, while sugars follow the opposite pattern.

This phenomenon, known as homochirality, has puzzled scientists for more than a century. Existing explanations have struggled to account for why one specific version was selected globally.

This artificial leaf turns pollution into power

Cambridge researchers have engineered a solar-powered “artificial leaf” that mimics photosynthesis to make valuable chemicals sustainably. Their biohybrid device combines organic semiconductors and enzymes to convert CO₂ and sunlight into formate with high efficiency. It’s durable, non-toxic, and runs without fossil fuels—paving the way for a greener chemical industry.

‘Liquid droplet mops’ clean solar panels with 99.9% efficiency, cutting water use by 80%

With the rapid expansion of the global solar energy industry, the number of solar panels has surged in recent years. However, pollutants accumulating on panel surfaces can significantly reduce energy conversion efficiency while traditional cleaning methods are highly water-intensive.

In response to this challenge, an international research team led by the Department of Mechanical Engineering at City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) has successfully developed a breakthrough technology, called “liquid droplet mops,” that uses only a minimal amount of water to effectively remove dust and pollutants from solar panel surfaces, significantly enhancing cleaning efficiency while conserving water.

The study was led by Professor Steven Wang, Associate Vice President (Resources Planning) and Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the School of Energy and Environment. The project was conducted in collaboration with Professor Omar Matar from the Department of Chemical Engineering at the Imperial College London. The findings are published in Nature Sustainability.

Tiny ‘light-concentrating’ particles boost terahertz technology, study shows

Scientists have found a way to boost terahertz technology using particles thousands of times smaller than a grain of sand. Research published in Scientific Reports by Loughborough University’s Emergent Photonics Research Center shows how a sparse layer of nanoparticles can make materials that produce terahertz radiation more efficient.

Terahertz radiation sits between microwaves and infrared on the electromagnetic spectrum and has a range of potential uses. It can “see” through materials like clothing or plastic and detect chemical fingerprints, with applications in security screening, medical imaging, materials testing, and wireless communications.

But existing devices are limited by how efficiently they can generate terahertz waves.

New study reveals CRISPR enzyme that responds to human DNA methylation

Cancer cells excel at evading detection, but subtle chemical differences set them apart from healthy cells. Now, a team of scientists from Wageningen University & Research and Van Andel Institute has identified a way to exploit this distinction. Using a variant of CRISPR, a modern tool for editing DNA, they distinguished tumor DNA from healthy DNA and selectively cut only the former. The study, published today in Nature, is an early but promising step toward a cancer therapy that targets and destroys tumor cells with high precision.

The new method relies on methyl groups, small chemical tags attached to DNA that regulate whether genes are on or off. This process, called DNA methylation, is altered in cancer cells and can act as a molecular “fingerprint” that differentiates malignant cells from healthy ones.

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