Professor Chi Ming Che, Zhou Guangzhao Professor in Natural Sciences and Chair Professor of Chemistry, Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, The University of Hong Kong (HKU), and the Laboratory for Synthetic Chemistry and Chemical Biology Limited (LSCCB), and Dr Wei Liu, Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, HKU, and LSCCB, have developed an innovative portable AI-enabled optical sensing device that enables rapid, non-invasive cancer risk detection using just a saliva sample. This innovative technology integrates advanced chemical sensing with artificial intelligence and was awarded a Gold Medal with Congratulations of the Jury at the 51st International Exhibition of Inventions of Geneva (2026), recognising its scientific excellence and strong potential for practical application.   

Minnesota Sea Grant researchers documented PFAS as a persistent presence in the Great Lakes atmosphere, with PFAS appearing in every rain and snow sample collected during a two-year project across Minnesota and Michigan. The researchers will present three analyses from the United States Geological Survey-funded project, Tracing Atmospherically Deposited PFAS from Source to Sediment in the Great Lakes Region, at the National Atmospheric Deposition Program Scientific Symposium, June 9-12, 2026, in Madison, Wisconsin.

A new web tool called StructureMASST lets anyone search the world’s public metabolomics data by chemical structure.

Dan Russell from Pennsylvania State University will present his acoustic analysis of torpedo bats as part of the 190th ASA Meeting. He used modal analysis, which involves striking the bat with a special hammer and measuring both the impact force and the resulting vibrations. By striking and measuring at various points, he can see how movement in each part of the bat affects every other part. The analysis shows that the torpedo bat shape does affect the location of the sweet spot, which likely impacts how the bat feels.

In Olympic weightlifting, athletes must account for the barbell’s “whip,” which is the bouncy bendiness of a bar under dynamic movements and can be affected by the steel alloy the barbell is made of, its coating, and how it connects to its sleeve. Lifters use the whip to assist the upward motion of the bar by timing the bounciness. Joshua Langlois will present work studying these Olympic barbell vibrations as part of the 190th ASA Meeting.

Our Solar System is currently passing through the Local Interstellar Cloud, a region of highly diluted gas and dust between the stars. On its path, Earth continuously accumulates iron-60, a rare radioactive isotope of iron produced in stellar explosions. This has now been confirmed by an international research team led by the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) through the analysis of Antarctic ice tens of thousands of years old. From the steady but time-varying influx, the researchers conclude that the radioactive isotope has been stored within the cloud since a long-past stellar explosion. The results have been published in the journal Physical Review Letters (DOI:10.1103/nxjq-jwgp).

MIT researchers developed a way to precisely move columns of individual atoms within a material, to produce exotic quantum properties. The approach works in minutes at room temperature, and could aid the development of stable quantum devices.

Global efforts to combat climate change often focus on what we can see: forests, renewable energy, and surface-level farming practices. A new analysis argues that one of the most significant battlegrounds in carbon sequestration lies hidden deep underground. A comprehensive review led by Professor Nanthi Bolan at The University of Western Australia consolidates global knowledge on deep soil carbon, the massive carbon reserve stored more than 30 centimeters below the surface, which has long been excluded from standard carbon accounting.

The paper provides a critical assessment of this enormous carbon sink, noting that deep soil layers (below 30 cm) contain over 850 petagrams of carbon worldwide. This accounts for approximately 50-60% of the total carbon stored in the top meter of soil. While surface soil carbon is closely tied to vegetation and is quick to respond to management changes, deep carbon dynamics are governed by different, more permanent factors.