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Category: energy – Page 14

Quantum computer outperforms supercomputers in approximate optimization tasks

A quantum computer can solve optimization problems faster than classical supercomputers, a process known as “quantum advantage” and demonstrated by a USC researcher in a paper recently published in Physical Review Letters.

The study shows how , a specialized form of quantum computing, outperforms the best current classical algorithms when searching for near-optimal solutions to complex problems.

“The way quantum annealing works is by finding low-energy states in , which correspond to optimal or near-optimal solutions to the problems being solved,” said Daniel Lidar, corresponding author of the study and professor of electrical and computer engineering, chemistry, and physics and astronomy at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering and the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

More than 90 per cent of Spain’s power restored

Power in Spain and Portugal has been mostly restored after a mass blackout paralysed most of the Iberian Peninsula.

Just over 92 per cent of Spain’s power is back, REE, the country’s electricity operator said early on Tuesday, and around 80 per cent of customers in Portugal are reported to have electricity.

Spain has declared a state of emergency in what is believed to be Europe’s largest power cut.

Diamonds are forever? World-first carbon-14 diamond battery made

Scientists and engineers from the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) and the University of Bristol have successfully created the world’s first carbon-14 diamond battery.

This new type of battery has the potential to power devices for thousands of years, making it an incredibly long-lasting energy source.

The battery leverages the radioactive isotope, carbon-14, known for its use in radiocarbon dating, to produce a diamond battery.

Atomically dispersed barium hydride catalysts enable deuteration of nonactivated alkylarenes

Alkali and alkaline earth metal hydrides hold great promise for hydrogen storage and hydrogen-involved chemical transformations due to the unique properties of hydridic hydrogen (H-). However, bulk hydrides often suffer from high lattice energy and limited exposure of active sites, hindering their catalytic performance.

In a study published in Nature Communications, a research group led by Prof. Guo Jianping and Prof. Chen Ping from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, collaborating with Prof. Chang Fei from Yongjiang Laboratory and Prof. Rao Li, from Central China Normal University, developed atomically dispersed barium catalysts for the synthesis of deuterated alkylarenes.

Researchers synthesized atomically dispersed barium hydride catalysts on (BaH/MgO) using a convenient impregnation-hydrogenation method. This (sub)nanostructured hydride material acted as an efficient, transition metal-free heterogeneous catalyst for hydrogen activation and hydrogen isotope exchange reactions across a range of nonactivated alkylarene substrates.

Forged in Fire: How Gamma-Ray Bursts Could Create the Universe’s Heaviest Elements

Physicists propose that high-energy photon jets from collapsing stars may be secret factories of heavy elements like plutonium, challenging traditional theories and possibly explaining strange cosmic glows and metal traces in Earth’s crust. One of the biggest unanswered questions in physics is ho

Japanese scientists’ approach can enable cheap hydrogen fuel production

Scientists have demonstrated that a surface reconstruction strategy can enable affordable hydrogen fuel production. The hydrogen fuel is created using The hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). However, scaling this process from a lab experiment to large-scale commercial production has been challenging.

Now, scientists in Japan have showcased that a surface reconstruction pathway can produce durable, non-noble metal-based cathodes that speed up the HER reaction.

Researchers highlighted that they can maintain their performance for more than 300 hours and are calculated to cost very close to the US Department of Energy’s 2026 H2 production target ($2.00 per kgH2-1).