11-Feb-2026 ORNL corrosion expertise in demand by fusion, advanced fission industries DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are helping to enable the next generation of abundant, affordable nuclear energy by combining 80 years of know-how with the latest scientific techniques, facilities and equipment. The lab’s longstanding expertise in degradation of materials in the harsh environments of nuclear reactors make it the go-to place for a resurgence of interest in liquid metals and molten salts for both advanced fission and fusion reactors.
11-Feb-2026 First UCSF health patient to move from total artificial heart to transplant University of California - San Francisco UCSF Health has performed its first heart transplant for a patient with advanced heart failure who had received an artificial heart a few months earlier.
11-Feb-2026 PolyU HEROCARE earns global recognition and reaches a new milestone in paediatric cancer care The Hong Kong Polytechnic University The HEROCARE (Holistic Empowerment in Radiation Oncology) programme, led by experts from the Department of Health Technology and Informatics and the Industrial Centre at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU), has achieved international acclaim. It recently received both the “Global Excellence Award” and “Impact Catalyst Award” at the 2025 International Sustainable Design Awards, demonstrating PolyU’s leadership in design-driven innovation that enhances healthcare experiences and treatment outcomes.
11-Feb-2026 KIER boosts direct air CO₂ capture capacity 19-fold in just one year National Research Council of Science & Technology The research team led by Dr. Young Cheol Park of the CCS Research Department at the Korea Institute of Energy Research (President: Yi, Chang-Keun, hereinafter “KIER”) successfully increased the amount of CO₂ captured from the air by 19-fold in just one year, from approximately 1 kg per day. The newly developed process also successfully completed more than 1,000 hours of demonstration operation, indicating strong potential for larger-scale demonstrations in the future. Funder Ministry of Science and ICT
11-Feb-2026 Rocket science? 3D printing soft matter in zero gravity Universiteit van Amsterdam What happens to soft matter when gravity disappears? To answer this, UvA physicists launched a fluid dynamics experiment on a sounding rocket. The suborbital rocket reached an altitude of 267 km before falling back to Earth, providing six minutes of weightlessness.
11-Feb-2026 Research could help roses—and food—last longer University of Texas at Arlington As Valentine’s Day approaches, the race is on for florists nationwide to keep their bouquets of flowers looking fresh in their stores and blooming long after they’re purchased. Standing in the way of victory is ethylene, a naturally occurring plant hormone that speeds aging and shortens vase life. Helping challenge its effects is Rasika Dias, distinguished research professor and chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at The University of Texas at Arlington, who is leading research to slow the aging process in both cut flowers and produce.
11-Feb-2026 Incheon National University researchers reveal how U.S. foreign policy affects Taiwanese public support for independence Incheon National University The United States has long maintained strategic ambiguity toward Taiwan to deter escalation by both Beijing and Taipei. A survey of Taiwanese citizens by Incheon National University researchers shows that support for de jure independence is low and conditional, shaped by U.S. policy and Chinese coercion. Clearer U.S. security commitments raise support under limited pressure but fail once China escalates militarily. U.S. leaders should therefore avoid making explicit commitments to defend—or not defend—Taiwan. Journal Journal of Chinese Political Science
11-Feb-2026 Extraterrestrial strategy: How the US could achieve energy dominance in space DOE/Idaho National Laboratory Energy is fundamentally important — researchers have linked a lack of reliable energy to poor physical health, poor mental health and higher mortality rates. But when astronauts push the boundaries of space exploration, energy is a matter of life and death.
11-Feb-2026 Frontier provides high-fidelity insights into turbine aerothermal performance DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory In a long-running collaboration with GE Aerospace, researchers at the University of Melbourne in Australia have been steadily working to improve the performance of high-pressure turbine (HPT) engines through computer simulations on leadership-class computing systems. Using ORNL's Frontier supercomputer, the Melbourne team investigated how the surface degradation of turbine blades affects their aerothermal performance with unprecedented simulations of 10 to 20 billion grid points in size,
11-Feb-2026 Akpa helps design modeling tools to broaden protective immune responses University of Tennessee at Knoxville Researchers, including the University of Tennessee, Knoxville’s Belinda Akpa, are using predictive modeling and machine learning to design universal vaccines that could provide lifelong protection against viruses and cancer. The APECx initiative integrates computational and biological methods to accelerate vaccine development, improve effectiveness, and make immunization more accessible and adaptable.
