Arizona State University scientists are part of an international research team that discovered a simple, soil-based method to keep locusts from eating crops. To their knowledge, it’s the first study to test this method in real-world farming conditions. The team worked with 100 farmers in Senegal who experience outbreaks of the Senegalese grasshopper, which are consistently devastating for Senegalese farmers. Each farmer grew two plots of millet — one treated with nitrogen fertilizer and one untreated. Compared with the untreated plots, the treated plots showed three clear differences: fewer locusts, less crop damage, and a twofold increase in crop yield. This breakthrough represents an important step forward in the sustainable management of migratory pests.

The organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology behind flexible cell phones, curved monitors, and televisions could one day be used to make on-skin sensors that show changes in temperature, blood flow, and pressure in real time. An international collaboration, led by researchers from Seoul National University in the Republic of Korea and Drexel University, has developed a flexible and stretchable OLED that could put the technology on track for this use and a range of new applications.

A study published in Nature Physics Jan. 14, co-led by Rice University’s Qimiao Si, brings together quantum criticality, where electrons fluctuate between different phases, and electronic topology, which describes a form of quantum organization based on the wave behavior of electrons. The researchers found that strong interactions among electrons can produce topological behavior, paving the way for new technologies that could use this quantum state in real-world applications.

Researchers have created a self-healing composite that is tougher than materials currently used in aircraft wings, turbine blades and other applications – and can repair itself more than 1,000 times. The researchers estimate their self-healing strategy can extend the lifetime of conventional fiber-reinforced composite materials by centuries compared to the current decades-long design-life.