It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, September 06, 2020
US Federal judge rules DeVos policy altering private schools' COVID-19 relief is illegal Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos lost a court battle Friday when a judge struck down her department's rule on pandemic relief funding for private schools as illegal. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI | License Photo
Sept. 5 (UPI) -- A federal judge has struck down Education Secretary Betsy DeVos' rule that altered the share of COVID-19 relief funding private schools are allowed as illegal.
U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, who President Donald Trump nominated to the court, ruled that DeVos violated the CARES Act, which required COVID-19 relief funding to comply with federal statute.
Section 1117 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 requires that federal funding for private schools be based on the number of low-income students. The CARES Act stipulated that the $13 billion that Congress set aside for K-12 schools in the CARES Act be distributed in that manner.
However, the Department of Education headed by DeVos, a billionaire who has advocated for private school vouchers, altered the funding formula Congress had laid out when it issued an interim final rule in July that said private schools could received the funding "regardless of low-income student population."
DeVos had argued that the text of the CARES Act was ambiguous, but the judge disagreed.
"In enacting the education funding provisions of the CARES Act, Congress spoke with a clear voice," Friedrich wrote in her opinion Friday. "It declared that relief funding shall be provided to private schools 'in the same manner as provided under section 1117."
Plaintiffs, including the NAACP, public school parents and school districts across the country, represented by the law firm Munger, Tolles & Olson, along with the Education Law Center and the Southern Poverty Law Center, lauded the ruling.
"The decision sends a clear signal that Secretary DeVos cannot use illegal means to advance her agenda of funneling scarce public resources to private education, to the detriment of our highest need students in public schools across the country," a partner at Munger, Tolles & Olson said in a statement. "We are particularly grateful that the court issued this decision quickly so that public school districts do not lose any more time in meeting the urgent needs of their students during this pandemic."
WHITE PUNKS ON DOPE Opioids leading cause of drug overdose deaths in first half of 2019 Opioids accounted for 80% of all drug overdose-related deaths in the first half of 2019, according to new CDC data. Photo by LizM/Pixabay
Sept. 3 (UPI) -- More than 80% of all drug overdose deaths reported across the country in the first half of 2019 involved opioids, according to figures released Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
All of the 10 most common drugs or drug combinations found in overdose-related deaths during the first six months of last year included at least one opioid, the agency said.
Drugs used in these cases included illicitly manufactured fentanyl, heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and prescription opioid-based pain medications. Either alone or in combination, the five drugs were a factor in 77% of all drug overdose-related deaths.
"Three of four opioid overdose deaths involved illicitly manufactured fentanyl," the CDC researchers wrote. "[These drugs], heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine -- alone or in combination -- were involved in nearly 85% of overdose deaths."
Overdose death rates across the country in general dropped by 4.1 percent from 2017 to 2018, according to figures released by the CDC earlier this year.
Still, between 1999 and 2018, more than 750,000 Americans died following a drug overdose, the agency estimates.
The findings for the latest report are based on drug overdose death records in 24 states and Washington, D.C., for Jan. 1 to June 30 of last year.
In all regions, overdose deaths involving opioids without stimulants were most common, followed by deaths involving opioids and stimulants and deaths involving stimulants without opioids. RUST BELT JUNKIES The pattern was most prominent in the Northeast and Midwest, where deaths involving opioids -- with or without stimulants -- accounted for 88% and 83% of all overdose deaths.
Among overdose deaths involving opioids, more than half of those who died were aged 25 to 44 years, and more than two-thirds of all overdose deaths involved men and three-quarters occurred in non-Hispanic White Americans.
"Evidence of injection drug use was more common among opioid-involved deaths than among deaths that did not involve opioids," the agency researchers wrote.
LITTLE GOD KING Japan's Supreme Court endorses exclusion
of pro-North Korea schools Pro-North Korean schools in Aichi Prefecture, Japan, lost a case at Japan's Supreme Court, according to Japanese press reports on Friday. File Photo by Keizo Mori/UPI | License Photo
Sept. 4 (UPI) -- Japan's Supreme Court ruled a Japanese government decision to exclude pro-Pyongyang Korean schools from state benefits is not illegal following multiple lawsuits filed by the schools.
The court said Thursday schools in Japan's Aichi Prefecture affiliated with the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, the pro-North Korean organization known as Chongryon, are not eligible for subsidies, including coronavirus relief, because of the Kim family worship required among students at the schools, Kyodo News reported Friday.
The idolization of the ruling Kims at the school is "unjust," the court said. Japanese policy toward pro-Pyongyang schools, affiliated with a group that channels financial support to North Korea, has changed with administrations.
In 2010, when the now-dissolved Democratic Party of Japan was in power, Tokyo included pro-Pyongyang schools in benefits including tuition-free education. When the conservative Liberal Democratic Party of Japan returned to power, the schools were left out from benefits, starting in 2013, according to South Korean newspaper Hankyoreh.
The North Korean schools have filed lawsuits in other districts, including Tokyo and Osaka, but lost their fight in courts. The schools have claimed they are the targets of societal discrimination.
Chongryon has operated for decades in Japan, running schools and banking systems. According to analyst Markus Bell, the group acts as a tax collector for ethnic Koreans in Japan who support North Korea. The organization sends billions of Japanese yen to Pyongyang, where the government may have not suspended the development of weapons of mass destruction.
In August, the Japanese government excluded pro-North Korean schools from receiving coronavirus relief, Tokyo Shimbun reported. The move came after Tokyo decided to exclude the schools from benefits such as free early childhood education.
The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has raised concerns about lack of state subsidies for the schools.
Saturday, September 05, 2020
Inequality of opportunity drags down everyone's motivation
Unequal compensation reduces people's motivation to work, even among those who stand to benefit from unfair advantages, finds a new UCL-led study.
The researchers found that large disparities in rewards offered for the same task reduce people's happiness, which in turn reduce their willingness to work, in the study published in PLOS One.
Lead author, Dr Filip Gesiarz (UCL Psychology & Language Sciences) said: "Here we have shown the psychological impacts of inequality of opportunity, and how it can hurt the productivity and well-being of everyone involved.
"Our findings may shed light on how psychological mechanisms, apart from structural barriers, can contribute to higher unemployment and lower university application rates of people from disadvantaged backgrounds. It's more difficult to motivate yourself to work hard if you know that other people will be more generously rewarded for the same effort."
For the study, 810 participants were asked to complete a simple task in exchange for some money. In different scenarios across three experiments, participants were told that other people were being paid more or less than they were for the same task, to varying degrees of inequality. They were given the option of refusing to work on a given task, and in some of the trials, they were also asked how they were feeling.
The researchers found that when people were told there were wide disparities in pay between them and their peers, they were less willing to work, including participants who were told that other people were being paid much less than they were.
The findings show how people are less motivated to work if they are being paid less than others, but also if they perceive the whole system to be unjust.
Dr Gesiarz said: "People who are economically disadvantaged might face a two-fold reduction in motivation and well-being - first due to their lower relative position, and second due to their reaction to the unfair distribution of opportunities."
The findings showed that a large disparity in rewards brought about greater unhappiness, which was in turn associated with lower willingness to work. People were more likely to refuse to work in an unfair scenario, even if they would benefit, and despite their refusal being a private decision that had no impact on other people's rewards.
The researchers speculate that the negative feelings caused by arbitrary disparities may in part explain why disadvantaged people are more likely to experience anxiety and depression.
Co-author Dr Jan-Emmanuel De Neve (University of Oxford) said: "This study documents yet another example of a 'poverty trap': a situation in which being put at a disadvantage by random circumstances decreases a person's motivation to work, further worsening their situation."
Senior author Professor Tali Sharot (UCL Psychology & Language Sciences) said: "Whether inequality will negatively affect those at the top in 'the real world', outside the lab, remains to be studied. One thing to consider is that in our experiment, people were made aware that their position was randomly assigned. In the 'real world' people many times assume that their good fortune is justified by their talent and effort and therefore inequality might not have a negative influence on the motivation and well-being of privileged individuals in those situations. This is an important question that we hope to answer in the future."
###
The study was funded by Wellcome.
Intelligent software for district renewable energy management
SWISS CENTER FOR ELECTRONICS AND MICROTECHNOLOGY - CSEM
New homes are increasingly being outfitted with solar panels, heat pumps, rechargeable batteries and other means of producing and storing heat, electricity and gas, all of which interconnect with the electrical grid. At the level of an entire neighborhood, these decentralized, intermittent energy sources form a complex network, which can also include energy-consuming installations such as electric vehicle charging stations.
Managing these multi-energy systems and optimizing energy costs raises a number of questions. Should energy be consumed when it is produced, sold to the grid, or stored for later use? And how should various energy sources be distributed if there are groups of consumers generating their own energy?
Orchestrating the production and consumption of energy
CSEM has developed smart, predictive software capable of providing real-time answers to these questions. Designed for non-specialists, it makes use of weather forecasts, data from local infrastructure, residents' consumption habits and market energy costs. As its name indicates, Maestro is like an orchestra conductor that automatically manages resources and keeps costs down. An online simulator, based on a building with eight family apartments, is available here.
Determining the best time to consume energy
"All of Maestro's decisions are based on cost management," says Tomasz Gorecki, one of CSEM's engineers behind the system. "When a solar panel is in use, for example, the software can tell you whether it's more advantageous to charge your electric vehicle, store the energy, or sell it to the grid. The system works for individual homes, but it could also prove to be very useful for a self-sufficient community, sharing various renewable energy sources across several homes," he adds. The system has already been successfully installed in two private homes and in an apartment building in collaboration with Soleco. Negotiations are underway to fit out an entire neighborhood currently under construction in Zurich. Maestro was also presented at the IFAC World Congress in Berlin.
How Maestro works
The software is easy to use and can be quickly adapted to individual neighborhoods. To start with, parameters such as solar panel size, buildings' surface area, battery storage capacity and user preferences and priorities are fed into a planning tool.
Production data from energy installations, provided by sensors, are then sent to the cloud, where Maestro automatically compares possible consumption decisions and identifies the most cost-effective one. Instructions are sent back to the computer, which carries them out on site.
Maestro can incorporate boilers, heat pumps and electric vehicle charging stations, as well as electric batteries, renewable energy sources such as solar panels and wind turbines, power-to-gas facilities, thermal storage tanks, and more.
What sets Maestro apart from other energy management systems?
Other systems on the market are designed only for individual homes and often employ a very simple mechanism of increasing power consumption whenever solar energy is produced. Maestro, on the other hand, can be used just as well for an entire neighborhood, where the network is more complex. It can also accommodate other energy-consuming installations such as electric vehicle charging stations and home heating and cooling systems. What's more, Maestro looks at weather forecasts for the coming days, which means that it can factor future needs into its consumption decisions. More broadly, the system is designed to keep costs down.
Could this focus on cost actually lead to increased energy consumption?
No, that shouldn't happen. Whenever surplus energy is produced, for example, the system will sell it to the grid if storing it for later use wouldn't be possible or cost-efficient. In making this decision, the system takes into account the losses that would be incurred by storing the energy in batteries. It's all about determining the best time and most rational way to use the energy.
What sort of cost savings are possible?
The cost savings will vary from home to home and user to user. A preliminary study on the first house running Maestro revealed an approximately 20% reduction in heating costs alone.
A chemist from RUDN developed a green catalyst for pharmaceutical and industrial chemistry
IMAGE: MANY PRODUCTION FACILITIES (E.G. PLASTIC MANUFACTURERS, PHARMA COMPANIES, AND OTHERS) USE NANOCATALYSTS THAT CONTAIN PALLADIUM--AN EXPENSIVE COMPONENT THAT IS NOT SUSTAINABLY PRODUCED. A CHEMIST FROM RUDN UNIVERSITY FOUND A WAY... view more
CREDIT: RUDN UNIVERSITY
Many production facilities (e.g. plastic manufacturers, pharma companies, and others) use nanocatalysts that contain palladium--an expensive component that is not sustainably produced. A chemist from RUDN University found a way to reduce palladium consumption and to make its manufacture more eco-friendly. He developed a catalyst based on a substance that comes from plant waste. Using his invention, manufacturers could cut palladium consumption in half. Moreover, new catalysts can be reused multiple times without any decrease in efficiency. The results of the study were published in the journal Molecular Catalysis.
Cross-coupling is a type of reaction that involves combining carbon atoms from different organic molecules. Cross-coupling reactions are most widely spread ones in industrial chemistry. They are used to synthesize plastics, medicinal drugs, and other compounds and account for 17% of all reactions in medical chemistry only. The main component of cross-coupling is palladium nanoparticles. Palladium is one of the rarest elements on Earth, which makes it a very expensive catalyst. Moreover, it is mainly produced at mining facilities that pose a considerable threat to the environment. A chemist from RUDN University suggested solving all these issues with one new approach.
The consumption of palladium in cross-coupling reactions increases because the particles of palladium-containing catalysts tend to bind together. There are two ways to stop this. One could modify the chemical properties of the particles to weaken the reaction between their surfaces when they come in contact. Alternatively, the metal could be held in place physically with a framework or a grid. The chemist from RUDN University chose the second method and locked metal particles in their respective places using a multilayer shell with a magnetic core.
The core of the new nanocatalyst consists of iron oxide with high magnetic properties. The coating is made of a catechol-based polymer. Catechol is a substance that is found in plant cell walls and is produced from plant waste. Both these layers are ancillary and have no catalytic activity. The catalytic properties of the compound come from palladium nanoparticles that are incorporated into the second layer. The polymer fixes the particles in place and prevents them from binding together.
The new catalyst structure requires twice as little palladium as the old one: 1.5% of the total nanoparticle weight as opposed to 3-6%. Moreover, after a couple of production cycles, the core of the nanocomposite material can be cleaned up and reused. This method is not only good for the environment but also economically feasible, as it will make the production of medicinal drugs, plastics, and other products cheaper.
"Today chemists are especially interested in green catalysts. Our nanocatalysts contain a product of plant waste recycling and at the same time efficiently work in cross-coupling reactions. Therefore, not only are they able to reduce palladium consumption and make the production process cheaper, but also are beneficial for the environment. Moreover, we managed to showcase the universal nature of polymers based on plant catechols. The same approach can be used when working with other metals including platinum, silver, or gold, or with catalysts of other organic reactions," said Rafael Luque, PhD, Head of the Molecular Design and Synthesis of Innovative Compounds for Medicine Science Center at RUDN University.
###
Autophagy: the beginning of the end
Scientists reveal key steps in the formation of the recycling centers of the cell
IMAGE: AN ATG9 VESICLE SERVES AS A PLATFORM FOR THE RECRUITMENT OF THE AUTOPHAGIC MACHINERY. IT THEREBY FORMS A SEED FOR THE FORMATION OF AN AUTOPHAGOSOME AROUND THE CARGO BY ACCEPTING... view more
Autophagosomes first form as cup-shaped membranes in the cell, which then grow to engulf the cellular material designated for destruction. The formation of these membranes is catalyzed by a complex machinery of proteins. "We have a very good knowledge of the factors involved in autophagosomes formation", explains group leader Sascha Martens, "but how they come together to initiate the formation of these membranes has so far been enigmatic".
One of the factors is Atg9, a protein whose importance in the process was known, but whose role was not clear. Atg9 is found in small intracellular vesi-cles. Researchers Justyna Sawa-Makarska, Verena Baumann and Nicolas Coudevylle from the Martens lab now show that they form a platform on which the autophagy machinery can assemble to build the autophagosome. "Atg9 vesicles are abundant in the cell, which means they can be rapidly recruited when autophagosomes are needed", explains group leader Sascha Martens.
Cells encapsulate cargo in vesicles, so that they can be correctly transported and degraded in a chemical environment that is different to the one normally found in cells. Autophagosomes therefore consist of a double membrane made of phospholipids. This greasy envelope creates a waterproof package that separates material from the aqueous surroundings of the cell and marks it for degradation. However, Atg9 vesicles do not supply the bulk of the lipids to the growing autophagosome.
To understand a complex machinery like the cell, it often helps to take it apart and rebuild it. The biogenesis of autophagosome involves numerous proteins. By isolating and characterizing 21 of these components, the scientists have been able to rebuild parts of the autophagy machinery in the 'test tube' - an ar-duous process that took Sascha Martens and his team almost ten years. "With this approach we could reconstitute the early steps of autophagosome biogen-esis in a controlled manner", he says. With the elaborate toolkit the Martens lab has developed, the scientists now aim to unravel the next steps in the biogene-sis of the autophagosome. The research project was a collaboration of the Martens lab with Gerhard Hummer and Soeren von Bülow from the Max Planck Institute for Biophysics in Frankfurt and Martin Graef from the Max Planck In-stitute for Biology of Ageing in Cologne.
###
Publication in "Science":
Justyna Sawa-Makarska, Verena Baumann, Nicolas Coudevylle, Sören von Bu?low, Veronika Nogellova, Christine Abert, Martina Schuschnig, Martin Graef, Gerhard Hummer und Sascha Martens: Reconstitution of autophagosome nucleation defines Atg9 vesicles as seeds for membrane formation. Science 2020
DOI:10.1126/science.aaz7714
Images of captive torment in art
Japanese war camps highlight 'lost' part of history
IMAGE: ANON., FIGURES KISSING, 1942-45, WOOD, APPROXIMATE HEIGHT = 40?CM. COURTESY OF BARMERA VISITOR INFORMATION CENTRE, SOUTH AUSTRALIA. view more
CREDIT: COURTESY OF BARMERA VISITOR INFORMATION CENTRE, SOUTH AUSTRALIA.
Between the arrival of pearl divers and war brides - long after Japanese performers toured Australia 150 years ago - an untold chapter of World War Two history has emerged in a new study of wartime art made by almost 5000 prisoners of war in Australia and New Zealand.
Focusing on internment camps set up across Australia and NZ, Canterbury University and Flinders University art historians Richard Bullen and Tets Kimura examine some exquisite Japanese artworks produced during the extended period of war incarceration.
It gives a fascinating insight into the lives of these ethnic and part-Japanese PoWs and civilians, at a time of enforced detention at remote locations such as Cowra and Hay (NSW), Tatura in Victoria, Loveday and Woolenook camp (SA) and Featherston, Pahiatua and Somes Island in New Zealand.
"Australasian Japanese internment camps remain largely unheard of, and the art made by the internees has received no attention until the current research," they say in the new paper. "Although there were some very crudely made items made by the Japanese held in Australasia, many of the works are of surprising quality and suggest a level of artistic confidence and training."
Including the Cowra breakout and a standoff at the Featherston facility, the record of camp life focuses more on a narrative of violence, misunderstanding, racism, than the social history and isolating and traumatic experience of internment.
In the largely all-male camp environment, many of the works depict alluring female figures, with the cultural symbols of kimono, geisha and umbrella depicted in various ways.The paper outlines the stories of several such artworks, including the attached:
Editors - the images can be downloaded from the article, except Figure 3 which is privately owned and requires permission.
Read the article, Japanese Art in Australasia During the Second World War, by Richard Bullen and Tets Kimura, in the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Art, 2020, vol 20, 1, 107-124 DOI: 10.1080/14434318.2020.1764232.
For more details on personal stories of WWII detainees, see a comprehensive camp history in Australia by Flinders University Professor Peter Monteath, Captured Lives: Australia's Wartime Internment Camps (Canberra: NLA Publishing, 2018).
The case of ibuprofen: evidence of huge impact of COVID-19 misinformation when coming from credible sources
In March, in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in Europe, a tweet from the French Health Minister, Olivier Verán, advised patients with COVID-19 not to take ibuprofen, an anti-inflammatory drug with analgesic and antipyretic properties. He even warned that taking it would increase mortality among COVID-19 patients, even though the statement was not backed by any scientifically valid evidence. In spite of this information's spuriousness, it subsequently spread to a number of countries. UOC doctoral student Sergi Xaudiera and Ana SofÃa Cardenal, a researcher at the Faculty of Law and Political Science, have studied the digital reach of this unverified, Twitter-propagated information in Germany, France, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. The results show that misinformation has a huge impact when credible sources take part in propagating it. Based on a case study of Catalonia, the project also highlights the importance of local channels in disseminating or deactivating misinformation as, according to the study's conclusions, it is precisely the regional channels that have greatest impact in each territory.
Published in the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review, the research forms part of Sergi Xaudiera's doctoral thesis, in which he studies cases of misinformation in emergency situations. "Until now, most misinformation campaigns were instigated by unauthoritative users or partisan media. However, this case stands out for the fact that the fake news was echoed by political representatives (specifically, the French Health Minister) and respectable media outlets, who took it to a broader audience," the researcher explained.
From a WhatsApp voice message to the French Minister's Twitter account
The spark that spread the false news about ibuprofen to other European countries was the message posted by the French Minister on Twitter. However, the UOC researchers traced the story's trail back to a WhatsApp voice message in Germany. Following the digital footprint on the microblogging network, they also analysed how, over a period of two weeks, the story spread from its country of origin to users in the Netherlands, France and, finally, Spain and Italy. They looked at the role played by credible sources, such as political representatives and respected media outlets, in giving greater prominence to the misinformation.
The importance of official sources in matters such as these can be seen in the differences in how the information spread between France and Germany. "Even though the message originated in Germany, nobody took it seriously. The voice message was forwarded to different users but, as it was not possible to identify who originally recorded it, it lost credibility and the general tone of comments was basically to debunk it or make jokes about it," the research project's author highlighted. However, in France, where the message was sponsored by a credible source, the fake news had the greatest impact of all the countries studied and the comments refuting the information were virtually non-existent. Indeed, the project showed how other reliable sources, such as the media, reproduced the Minister's tweet without fact-checking, helping to take the information to greater segments of the population.
"Misinformation supported by reliable sources is particularly dangerous because their very credibility induces people to accept the recommendations without doubting or questioning the information on which they are based. In addition, these types of action, occurring during emergency situations, are particularly sensitive and, if treated incorrectly, they may have irreversible consequences," the researcher continued.
The other territories included in the study fall between these two extremes, combining messages that reproduced the fake news with others that said that it was not true. In Spain and Italy, the media and journalists were the first to debunk the misinformation, citing the French Minister's subsequent statements to disprove it. On 18 March, a second wave appeared in all the territories, and was quickly rejected by users. In spite of this, the news re-emerged in Italy and spread quickly between 20 and 23 March.
The power of local media in spreading information
Tracking the path taken by this information highlights the importance of governments' active presence on social media. "By practising active listening to detect conversations about how the emergency is being handled, governments can act quickly whenever inaccurate information attains a certain level of visibility," Xaudiera explained. The study's researchers also found that even though supragovernmental agencies such as the World Health Organization and the European Medicines Agency dismissed the information as untrue, the fake information continued to spread unabated until it was denied by each region's official channels. According to the authors, this points to a strong regional dimension in the dissemination of information.
With the goal of determining the effectiveness of local official sources in discrediting fake news, the researchers studied the specific case of Catalonia. The results showed that most of the Catalan users who contributed to spreading unverified information were not following official sources when the information was published. However, the vast majority of those who shared messages that contributed to discrediting the misinformation were following official channels.
"Misinformation is counteracted most effectively by local sources. When a false narrative starts to circulate in a region, it is the local channels that must help in checking the information and exposing it as fake when necessary. We have seen that following local official channels has a positive effect. However, when it is these channels that are putting out fake information, the region's citizens may become impervious to accurate information," Xaudiera said. In such cases, social media's role becomes particularly complex. "Social platforms (in this case, Twitter) can and must do more to prevent fake information from circulating in their ecosystems. This is particularly critical in cases such as that studied by us, as they are credible, verified channels that are disseminating incorrect information on the platform," he stressed.
Faced with fake information such as the statements about ibuprofen, the researchers recommend following official sources and viewing the information we receive critically, checking it on several sources from different, geographically separate origins, if possible. In addition, on the institutional level, they propose approaching cybersecurity from an information and communication viewpoint. "Until now, cybersecurity was seen purely as a technology issue. However, these cases show that the threat involves much more than technology and the social aspects must be studied as well," Xaudiera concluded.
###
Chemistry's Feng Lin Lab is splitting water molecules for a renewable energy future
IMAGE: CHEMISTRY GRADUATE STUDENT ZHIJIE YANG IS OPERATING SYNCHROTRON MEASUREMENT COMPUTER AT ADVANCED PHOTON SOURCE OF THE ARGONNE NATIONAL LAB IN A PHOTO TAKEN BEFORE THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC. view more
CREDIT: VIRGINIA TECH
The future economy based on renewable and sustainable energy sources might utilize battery-powered cars, large-scale solar and wind farms, and energy reserves stored in batteries and chemical fuels. Although there are examples of sustainable energy sources in use already, scientific and engineering breakthroughs will determine the timeline for widespread adoption.
One proposed paradigm for shifting away from fossil fuels is the hydrogen economy, in which hydrogen gas powers society's electrical needs. To mass produce hydrogen gas, some scientists are studying the process of splitting water -- two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom -- which would result in hydrogen fuel and breathable oxygen gas.
Feng Lin, an assistant professor of chemistry in the Virginia Tech College of Science, is focusing on energy storage and conversion research. This work is part of a new study published in the journal Nature Catalysis that solves a key, fundamental barrier in the electrochemical water splitting process where the Lin Lab demonstrates a new technique to reassemble, revivify, and reuse a catalyst that allows for energy-efficient water splitting. Chunguang Kuai, a former graduate student of Lin's, is first author of the study with Lin and co-authors chemistry graduate students Zhengrui Xu, Anyang Hu, and Zhijie Yang.
The core idea of this study goes back to a subject in general chemistry classes: catalysts. These substances increase the rate of a reaction without being consumed in the chemical process. One way a catalyst increases the reaction rate is by decreasing the amount of energy needed for the reaction to commence.
Water may seem basic as a molecule made up of just three atoms, but the process of splitting it is quite difficult. But Lin's lab has done so. Even moving one electron from a stable atom can be energy-intensive, but this reaction requires the transfer of four to oxidize oxygen to produce oxygen gas.
"In an electrochemical cell, the four-electron transfer process will make the reaction quite sluggish, and we need to have a higher electrochemical level to make it happen," Lin said. "With a higher energy needed to split water, the long-term efficiency and catalyst stability become key challenges."
In order to meet that high energy requirement, the Lin Lab introduces a common catalyst called mixed nickel iron hydroxide (MNF) to lower the threshold. Water splitting reactions with MNF work well, but due to the high reactivity of MNF, it has a short lifespan and the catalytic performance decreases quickly.
Lin and his team discovered a new technique that would allow for periodic reassembling to MNF's original state, thus allowing the process of splitting water to continue. (The team used fresh water in their experiments, but Lin suggests salt water - the most abundant form of water on Earth - could work as well.)
MNF has a long history with energy studies. When Thomas Edison tinkered with batteries more than a century ago, he also used the same nickel and iron elements in nickel hydroxide-based batteries. Edison observed the formation of oxygen gas in his nickel hydroxide experiments, which is bad for a battery, but in the case of splitting water, production of oxygen gas is the goal.
"Scientists have realized for a long time that the addition of iron into the nickel hydroxide lattice is the key for the reactivity enhancement of water splitting." Kuai said. "But under the catalytic conditions, the structure of the pre-designed MNF is highly dynamic due to the highly corrosive environment of the electrolytic solution."
During Lin's experiments, MNF degrades from a solid form into metal ions in the electrolytic solution -- a key limitation to this process. But Lin's team observed that when the electrochemical cell flips from the high, electrocatalytic potential to a low, reducing potential, just for a period of two minutes, the dissolved metal ions reassemble into the ideal MNF catalyst. This occurs due to a reversal of the pH gradient within the interface between the catalyst and the electrolytic solution.
"During the low potential for two minutes, we demonstrated we not only get nickel and iron ions deposited back into the electrode, but mixing them very well together and creating highly active catalytic sites," Lin said. "This is truly exciting, because we rebuild the catalytic materials at the atomic length scale within a few nano-meter electrochemical interface."
Another reason that the reformation works so well is that the Lin Lab synthesized novel MNF as thin sheets that are easier to reassemble than a bulk material.
Validating findings through X-rays
To corroborate these findings, Lin's team conducted synchrotron X-ray measurements at the Advanced Photon Source of Argonne National Laboratory and at Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource of SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. These measurements use the same basic premise as the common hospital X-ray but on a much larger scale.
"We wanted to observe what had happened during this entire process," Kuai said. "We can use X-ray imaging to literally see the dissolution and redeposition of these metal irons to provide a fundamental picture of the chemical reactions."
Synchrotron facilities require a massive loop, similar to the size of the Drillfield at Virginia Tech, that can perform X-ray spectroscopy and imaging at high speeds. This provides Lin high levels of data under the catalytic operating conditions. The study also provides insights into a range of other important electrochemical energy sciences, such as nitrogen reduction, carbon dioxide reduction, and zinc-air batteries.
"Beyond imaging, numerous X-ray spectroscopic measurements have allowed us to study how individual metal ions come together and form clusters with different chemical compositions," Lin said. "This has really opened the door for probing electrochemical reactions in real chemical reaction environments."
