MIT engineers have discovered a way to generate electricity using tiny carbon particles that can create an electric current simply by interacting with an organic solvent in which theyre floating. The particles are made from crushed carbon nanotubes (blue) coated with a Teflon-like polymer (green). Credit: Jose-Luis Olivares, MIT. Based on a figure courtesy of the researchers.

A new material made from carbon nanotubes can generate electricity by scavenging energy from its environment.

MIT engineers have discovered a new way of generating electricity using tiny carbon particles that can create a current simply by interacting with liquid surrounding them.

The liquid, an organic solvent, draws electrons out of the particles, generating a current that could be used to drive chemical reactions or to power micro- or nanoscale robots, the researchers say.

This mechanism is new, and this way of generating energy is completely new, says Michael Strano, the Carbon P. Dubbs Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT. This technology is intriguing because all you have to do is flow a solvent through a bed of these particles. This allows you to do electrochemistry, but with no wires.

In a new study describing this phenomenon, the researchers showed that they could use this electric current to drive a reaction known as alcohol oxidation an organic chemical reaction that is important in the chemical industry.

Strano is the senior author of the paper, which appears today (June 7, 2021) in Nature Communications. The lead authors of the study are MIT graduate student Albert Tianxiang Liu and former MIT researcher Yuichiro Kunai. Other authors include former graduate student Anton Cottrill, postdocs Amir Kaplan and Hyunah Kim, graduate student Ge Zhang, and recent MIT graduates Rafid Mollah and Yannick Eatmon.

The new discovery grew out of Stranos research on carbon nanotubes hollow tubes made of a lattice of carbon atoms, which have unique electrical properties. In 2010, Strano demonstrated, for the first time, that carbon nanotubes can generate thermopower waves. When a carbon nanotube is coated with layer of fuel, moving pulses of heat, or thermopower waves, travel along the tube, creating an electrical current.

That work led Strano and his students to uncover a related feature of carbon nanotubes. They found that when part of a nanotube is coated with a Teflon-like polymer, it creates an asymmetry that makes it possible for electrons to flow from the coated to the uncoated part of the tube, generating an electrical current. Those electrons can be drawn out by submerging the particles in a solvent that is hungry for electrons.

To harness this special capability, the researchers created electricity-generating particles by grinding up carbon nanotubes and forming them into a sheet of paper-like material. One side of each sheet was coated with a Teflon-like polymer, and the researchers then cut out small particles, which can be any shape or size. For this study, they made particles that were 250 microns by 250 microns.

When these particles are submerged in an organic solvent such as acetonitrile, the solvent adheres to the uncoated surface of the particles and begins pulling electrons out of them.

The solvent takes electrons away, and the system tries to equilibrate by moving electrons, Strano says. Theres no sophisticated battery chemistry inside. Its just a particle and you put it into solvent and it starts generating an electric field.

This research cleverly shows how to extract the ubiquitous (and often unnoticed) electric energy stored in an electronic material for on-site electrochemical synthesis, says Jun Yao, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, who was not involved in the study. The beauty is that it points to a generic methodology that can be readily expanded to the use of different materials and applications in different synthetic systems.

The current version of the particles can generate about 0.7 volts of electricity per particle. In this study, the researchers also showed that they can form arrays of hundreds of particles in a small test tube. This packed bed reactor generates enough energy to power a chemical reaction called an alcohol oxidation, in which an alcohol is converted to an aldehyde or a ketone. Usually, this reaction is not performed using electrochemistry because it would require too much external current.

Because the packed bed reactor is compact, it has more flexibility in terms of applications than a large electrochemical reactor, Zhang says. The particles can be made very small, and they dont require any external wires in order to drive the electrochemical reaction.

In future work, Strano hopes to use this kind of energy generation to build polymers using only carbon dioxide as a starting material. In a related project, he has already created polymers that can regenerate themselves using carbon dioxide as a building material, in a process powered by solar energy. This work is inspired by carbon fixation, the set of chemical reactions that plants use to build sugars from carbon dioxide, using energy from the sun.

In the longer term, this approach could also be used to power micro- or nanoscale robots. Stranos lab has already begun building robots at that scale, which could one day be used as diagnostic or environmental sensors. The idea of being able to scavenge energy from the environment to power these kinds of robots is appealing, he says.

It means you dont have to put the energy storage on board, he says. What we like about this mechanism is that you can take the energy, at least in part, from the environment.

Reference: Solvent-induced electrochemistry at an electrically asymmetric carbon Janus particle by Albert Tianxiang Liu, Yuichiro Kunai, Anton L. Cottrill, Amir Kaplan, Ge Zhang, Hyunah Kim, Rafid S. Mollah, Yannick L. Eatmon and Michael S. Strano, 7 June 2021, Nature Communications.DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-23038-7

The research was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and a seed grant from the MIT Energy Initiative.

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MIT Engineers Have Discovered a Completely New Way of Generating Electricity - SciTechDaily

TimberQuest employs cross-laminated timber to create prefabricated wall and roof panels offsite that are erected and installed at school construction sites, enabling buildings to be constructed in significantly shorter timeframes. The structures are pre-checked and approved by California's Division of the State Architect (DSA), so they can be used for any public school or community college project in California, reducing permitting time from six months to a single day. Most buildings can be constructed in 10 weeks over a summer break.

Here is a link to a "flythrough" video rendering of a TimberQuest classroom.

In addition to expedited project completion, TimberQuest buildings offer a healthy and eco-friendly environment. Their beautiful interiors feature the warmth and airiness of a tall wood ceiling, extensive natural lighting and an openness that contrasts with the sterile, box-like modular buildings often seen on many school campuses. TimberQuest structures are high-quality and permanentwith life expectancies of 50 years or morewith more usable floor space than traditional modular buildings. Yet, they can be delivered quickly, thanks to the pre-approved design as well as rapid factory fabrication and onsite erection, offering public and private schools the best of all worlds.

"The partnership between XL Construction, Aedis and Daedalus enables us to think holistically to solve design, permitting, procurement, prefabrication and installation issues," said Steve Winslow, SVP, XL Construction. "TimberQuest provides a superior environment for students to learn and teachers to teach."

"There are three ancient Roman principles expressed in a true piece of architecture: strength, practicality and beauty. This collaboration epitomizes the integration of these precepts into a flexible, durable, economical and environmentally responsible solution that addresses most schools' needs," said John Diffenderfer, president, Aedis Architects.

"Daedalus is excited to be a part of this collaboration which advances mass timber construction by developing a school buildings "kit-of-parts" for over-the-counter permitting," said Doug Robertson, president, Daedalus Structural Engineering. "By integrating cross-laminated timber panels with insulation, architectural finishes and other buildings systems in shop fabrication, we are able to deliver preassembled wall and roof panels to any school site for immediate erection and completion of sustainable, attractive and durable public school classroom buildings in record time."

TimberQuest Chosen by Sacred Heart Schools, Atherton for Building for Fall 2021 Session

Sacred Heart Schools, Atherton (SHS) in Atherton, Calif. is part of the Network of Sacred Heart Schools, a worldwide operation with schools in over 44 countries and a tradition of excellence dating back to its founding in Paris in the 1800s. Situated on a 63-acre campus, the institution provides preschool grade 12 programs that serve more than 800 families. With increased demand for space and calls for less capacity in lower grade classrooms due to social distancing requirements; the school saw an urgent need to expand its classroom space for its youngest students.

The project was awarded April 1, with completion projected by August 31 to be ready for the fall term. After reviewing TimberQuest's many benefits, SHS agreed to move forward on the new building which will serve its kindergarten students who previously shared a building with preschoolers.

"In line with the strategic growth of our campus, we were ready to expand our kindergarten space; we needed to both break ground and have construction complete during summer break," said Richard Dioli, SHS director of schools. "Another must was choosing a company that shared our commitment to sustainability. We worked with XL Construction previously, so it was natural for us to reach out to them for ideasand the TimberQuest concept had immediate appeal."

"Two of the things we liked most about the TimberQuest classroom design is the 'daylighting' created by the structure's large windows combined with the exposed wood interior that makes the classroom very pleasant and appealing," said Michael Dwyer, SHS director of operations. "The building's overall energy efficiency supports our sustainability philosophy and stands as a shining example of these values we teach to our students."

Building a Better School Environment Panel-by-Panel

The basic building block of TimberQuest construction is precision-machined, cross-laminated timber (CLT) that is available in large format structural slabs. It is strong, yet lightweight, fire resistant and leaves these structures with rich exposed wood finishes.

"Where one may think building with wood is bad for the environment, the opposite is true," said Matt Larson, preconstruction director, XL Construction. "Mass Timber construction, including the TimberQuest approach, supports responsible forest management, including the reduction of wildfires and protection of biodiversity. It also promotes rural economic development by expanding the market for sustainable forest products."

The carbon benefit of timber construction is well documented and has a two-fold benefit. First, utilization of a wood structure in lieu of steel or concrete has a significantly lower embodied carbon footprint, reducing the carbon footprint due to construction by 40-60%. Second, wood effectively sequesters carbon within the timber structure, storing it for the life of the structure and any subsequent reuse.

TimberQuest buildings are available in three- to nine-classroom sizes, between 3,000 and 9,000 square feet. A total of nine interior layouts are included in the precheck design, including standard classroom, large classroom, breakout space, office / conference, science, kindergarten and three restroom configurations. The all-electric design is also very efficient, utilizing heat pump technology to exceed California's Title 24 energy usage standards by between 35% and 60%. In addition to not relying on gas availability, TimberQuest buildings take full advantage of renewable energy resources.

For more information about TimberQuest, visit http://www.timber-quest.com or contact Matt Larson, XL Construction, (408) 240-6483, [emailprotected].

About XL Construction

XL Construction is a leading general contractor whose mission is to "build to improve lives." XL partners with today's leaders in life sciences, advanced technology, corporate office, civic, healthcare and education to create places that make its communities better. The company's focus and passion for team success has earned it a network of great partners and a reputation for putting people first. XL Construction is consistently ranked among the top general contractors in Northern California. In 2020, the company was named ENR California's Top General Contractor of 2020 and the #1 Best Place to Work in the Bay Area.

About Daedalus Structural Engineering

Daedalus is a structural engineering firm located in the heart of Silicon Valley with over 38 years of experience. We provide a full range of structural engineering services including seismic evaluation and retrofit design, civic, K-12 and higher education, corporate and custom residential projects with growing expertise in mass timber construction. At Daedalus, we believe that the structure provides an opportunity to expand and help shape the finished architecture and building envelope. Dedicated to the collaborative design process, we consistently strive to deliver engineering excellence, ingenuity, the best possible design aesthetics, cost control and the highest level of service on every project.

About Aedis Architects

Aedis is a Northern California based, full service architectural firm, whose mission is to create highly effective learning environments for California students and teachers. For more than six decades, the firm has helped public and private educational clients transform their schools into flexible, collaborative, healthy and sustainable environments that optimize learning and teaching. The use of Mass Timber is featured prominently in the firm's portfolio. From beautiful, natural and biophilic educational spaces that enrich student and faculty lives, to 'tall timber,' multi-family residential structures that help solve the housing crisis, each Mass Timber project addresses climate change and provides healthy environments for the occupants.

TimberQuest is a trademark of XL Construction. All other trade names are the property of their respective owners.

SOURCE XL Construction Corporation

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XL Construction, Aedis Architects and Daedalus Structural Engineering Partner to Develop New TimberQuest School Construction Product - PRNewswire

Students and teachers with interests in robotics and mechanical engineering from over 20 area middle and high schools enjoyed a first-hand look at displays containing some impressive hardware and projects at last weeks Dearborn Heights/Lawrence Technological University Robotics & Mechanical Engineering Fest. The Citys first-ever event of this type was held recently on the grounds of the Dearborn Heights HYPE Athletics Center.

A Lawrence Tech University professor poses with Nadia Fadel Bazzi.

Joining the students and teachers were LTU students and faculty, who were on-hand to meet with the students and answer questions about the numerous displays, which included robots in use by the University, as well as several motorsport vehicles that have been designed, built and raced by its engineering students.

The event was the brainchild of Dearborn Heights Mayor Bill Bazzi and Dr. Badih Jawad, Lawrence Technological Universitys Mechanical, Robotics, and Industrial Engineering Department Chair & Professor and supported by several LTU College of Engineering Faculty Members. It was spectacular to host the first Dearborn Heights Robotics & Mechanical Engineering Fest, Bazzi said. I was delighted to see LTU bring its resources to Dearborn Heights and put them on display for our areas students. We are grateful for the partnership with Dr. Jawad and his colleagues at LTUs College of Engineering who played such an instrumental role in its success. Coming from the engineering profession myself, it gave me great pleasure to help promote all the exciting possibilities this profession offers with our young students. LTU is one of the nations premier engineering schools, so the students who attended this event got a first-hand look at projects that are being designed and built by the best of the best. I am also grateful to Hype Athletics for sharing its facilities with us, for the Crestwood High School Robotics Team for bringing their robots to display, and once again, to the students who represent Crestwoods National Honors Society for their help. I am also grateful to our friends at the Dearborn Heights Target store their display, which included custom baskets with mini drones, gift cards, and other summer gifts that were raffled off. It was also great to see some friends from the U.S. Navy and the Army National Guard who brought a hummer to display and engage the students. All-in-all, it was a great event!

Lawrence Tech students work on their car.

Source: City of Dearborn Heights

Target employees were on hand at Hype Athletics during the event.

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Lawrence Technological University Robotics and Mechanical Engineering Fest draws large crowd - Dearborn Press and Guide

Can we reprogram existing life at will?

To synthetic biologists, the answer is yes. The central code for biology is simple. DNA letters, in groups of three, are translated into amino acidsLego blocks that make proteins. Proteins build our bodies, regulate our metabolism, and allow us to function as living beings. Designing custom proteins often means you can redesign small aspects of lifefor example, getting a bacteria to pump out life-saving drugs like insulin.

All life on Earth follows this rule: a combination of 64 DNA triplet codes, or codons, are translated into 20 amino acids.

But wait. The math doesnt add up. Why wouldnt 64 dedicated codons make 64 amino acids? The reason is redundancy. Life evolved so that multiple codons often make the same amino acid.

So what if we tap into those redundant extra codons of all living beings, and instead insert our own code?

A team at the University of Cambridge recently did just that. In a technological tour de force, they used CRISPR to replace over 18,000 codons with synthetic amino acids that dont exist anywhere in the natural world. The result is a bacteria thats virtually resistant to all viral infectionsbecause it lacks the normal protein door handles that viruses need to infect the cell.

But thats just the beginning of engineering lifes superpowers. Until now, scientists have only been able to slip one designer amino acid into a living organism. The new work opens the door to hacking multiple existing codons at once, copyediting at least three synthetic amino acids at the same time. And when its 3 out of 20, thats enough to fundamentally rewrite life as it exists on Earth.

Weve long thought that liberating a subset ofcodons for reassignment could improve the robustness and versatility of genetic-code expansion technology, wrote Drs. Delilah Jewel and Abhishek Chatterjee at Boston College, who were not involved in the study. This work elegantly transforms that dream into a reality.

Our genetic code underlies life, inheritance, and evolution. But it only works with the help of proteins.

The program for translating genes, written in DNAs four letters, into the actual building blocks of life relies on a full cellular decryption factory.

Think of DNAs lettersA, T, C, and Gas a secret code, written on a long slip of crinkled paper wrapped around a spool. Groups of three letters, or codons, are the cruxthey encode which amino acid a cell makes. A messenger molecule (mRNA), a spy of sorts, stealthily copies the DNA message and sneaks back into the cellular world, shuttling the message to the cells protein factorya sort of central intelligence organization.

There, the factory recruits multiple translators to decipher the genetic code into amino acids, aptly named tRNAs. The letters are grouped in threes, and each translator tRNA physically drags its associated amino acid to the protein factory, one by one, so that the factory eventually makes a chain that wraps into a 3D protein.

But like any robust code, nature has programmed redundancy into its DNA-to-protein translation process. For example, the DNA codes TCG, TCA, AGC, and AGT all encode for a single amino acid, serine. While it works in biology, the authors wondered: what if we tap into that code, hijack it, and redirect some of lifes directions using synthetic amino acids?

The new study sees natures redundancy as a way to introduce new capabilities into cells.

For us, one question was could you reduce the number of codons that are used to encode a particular amino acid, and thereby create codons that are free to create other monomers [amino acids]? asked lead author Dr. Jason Chin.

For example, if TCG is for serine, why not free up the othersTCA, AGC, and AGT for something else?

Its a great idea in theory, but a truly daunting task in practice. It means that the team has to go into a cell and replace every single codon they want to reprogram. A few years back, the same group showed that its possible in E. Coli, the lab and pharmaceuticals favorite bug. At that time, the team made an astronomical leap in synthetic biology by synthesizing the entire E. Coli genome from scratch. During the process, they also played around with the natural genome, simplifying it by replacing some amino acid codons with their synonymssay, removing TCGs and replacing them with AGCs. Even with the modifications, the bacteria were able to thrive and reproduce easily.

Its like taking a very long book and figuring out which words to replace with synonyms without changing the meaning of sentencesso that the edits dont physically hurt the bacterias survival. One trick, for example, was to delete a protein dubbed release factor 1, which makes it easier to reprogram the UAG codon with a brand new amino acid. Previous work showed that this can assign new building blocks to natural codons that are truly blankthat is, they dont encode anything naturally anyways.

Chins team took this much further. Using a method called REXER (replicon excision for enhanced genome engineering through programmed recombination)yeah, scientists are all about the backcronymsthe team used CRISPR to precisely snip out large parts of the E. Coli bacterial genome, made entirely from scratch inside a test tube.

They then used CRISPR-Cas9, the wunderkind gene editing tool, to snip out and replace more than 18,000 occurrences of extra codons that encode for serine with synonym codons. Because the trick only targeted redundant protein code, the cells were able to go about their normal businessincluding making serinebut now with multiple natural codons free. Its like replacing hi with oy, making hi now free to be assigned a completely different meaning.

The team next did some house cleaning. They removed the cells natural translatorsthe tRNAsthat normally read the now-defunct codons without harming the cells. They introduced new synthetic versions of tRNAs to read the new codons. The engineered bacteria were then naturally evolved inside a test tube to grow more rapidly.

The results were spectacular. The superpowered strain, Syn61.3(ev5), is basically a bacterial X-Men that grows rapidly and is resistant to a cocktail of different viruses that normally infects bacteria.

Because all of biology uses the same genetic code, the same 64 codons and the same 20 amino acids, that means viruses also use the same codethey use the cells machinery to build the viral proteins to reproduce the virus, explained Chin. Now that the bacteria cell can no longer read natures standard genetic code, the virus can no longer tap into the bacterial machinery to reproducemeaning the engineered cells are now resistant to being hijacked by almost any viral invader.

These bacteria may be turned into renewable and programmable factories that produce a wide range of new molecules with novel properties, which could have benefits for biotechnology and medicine, including making new drugs, such as new antibiotics, said Chin.

Viral infection aside, the study rewrites whats possible for synthetic biology.

This will enable countless applications, said Jewel and Chatterjee, such as completely artificial biopolymers, that is, materials compatible with biology that could change entire disciplines such as medicine or brain-machine interfaces. Here, the team was able to string up a chain of artificial amino acid building blocks to make a type of molecule that forms the basis of some drugs, such as those for cancer or antibiotics.

But perhaps the most exciting prospect is the ability to dramatically rewrite existing life. Similar to bacteria, weand all life in the biosphereoperate on the same biological code. The study now shows its possible to get past the hurdle of only 20 amino acids making up the building blocks of life by tapping into our natural biological processes.

Next up, the team is looking to potentially further reprogram our natural biological code to encode even more synthetic protein building blocks into bacterial cells. Theyll also move towards other cellsmammalian, for example, to see if its possible to compress our genetic code.

Image Credit: nadya_il from Pixabay

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Scientists Used CRISPR to Engineer a New 'Superbug' That's Invincible to All Viruses - Singularity Hub