Environment
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How Potatoes, Corn and Beans Led to Smart Windows Breakthrough
A study from researchers at The University of Texas at Austin aims to reduce the costs of smart windows by creating a new type of electrochromic device and materials.
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Texas Engineers Use Erwin Center as Blueprint for Sustainable Demolition
The Frank Erwin Center is coming down to make way for a new UT Austin-MD Anderson Cancer Center joint medical campus, but even in its demise, the former home of Longhorn basketball and many memorable moments in Austin's musical history is serving an important purpose.
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How AI Can Bolster Power Grid's Resistance to Weather, Cyberattacks
Texas Engineer Javad Mohammadi has dedicated his research to strengthening power grids, using artificial intelligence to make them more resistant to evolving threats.
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Simulating How Big Waves Impact Shorelines
The crash of waves on the beach to many is the picture of peace and relaxation, but it’s also an important moment in the surrounding landscape. Known as the swash zone, where waves run up the face of the beach, this area is where crucial sand movement occurs, shaping the world’s coastlines over time and impacting flooding and other weather events.
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Injectable Water Filtration System Could Improve Access to Clean Drinking Water Around the World
More than 2 billion people, approximately a quarter of the world’s population, lack access to clean drinking water. A new, portable and affordable water filtration solution created by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin aims to change that.
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AI-Powered Civil Engineering: New NSF-backed Community Aims to Transform U.S. Infrastructure
Texas Engineers are creating a new community to unite civil engineers, cyberinfrastructure professionals and experts in artificial intelligence to better understand and protect our virtual and physical infrastructure.
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Measuring Underwater Carbon Capture With Sound
Texas Engineers will lead a new project on marine carbon dioxide removal, capture and storage as part of a larger research push from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
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Curtailing Unhealthy Impacts of Steel Production: DOE Earthshot Program
Steel is one of the world’s most useful and valuable materials, but its production is among the most carbon-intensive manufacturing processes. Steel accounts for roughly 7% of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions, part of a broader industrial sector that accounted for about 30% of the greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. in 2021, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
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Pottery Becomes Water Treatment Device for Navajo Nation
Large chunks of the Navajo Nation in the Southwest lack access to clean drinkable water, a trend that has been rising in many parts of the U.S. in recent years. A research team led by engineers with The University of Texas at Austin aims to change that.
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Hot Summer Air Turns into Drinking Water With New Gel Device
For significant portions of the globe faced with water shortage problems a beacon of hope may be on the way: the ability to easily turn hot air into drinking water.
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Breakthrough Oil-Capturing Technology Offers 10x Improvement Cleaning Up Hazardous Spills
To combat the extreme environmental toll of major oil spills, researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have created a new technology that could significantly improve cleanup capabilities compared to today's methods.
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Poor Air Quality Deforms Our Cells; What Does It Mean for Their Health?
It's a well-known fact that air quality can impact our health. It's something that can be seen all the way down to the cellular level, as different pollutants in the air can influence biophysical cell characteristics.
Texas researchers are diving deep into this phenomenon, aiming to answer the question of how different types of respiratory cells handle the stress of toxic pollutants. More specifically, they're investigating cell shape, how it may serve as a distress signal of toxic air pollution and the impact of different mixtures of pollutants.
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Water-Purifying Cup Makes Drinkable Water From Creeks and Streams
A rash of storms in Texas in recent years — from Hurricane Harvey in 2017 to the deep freeze in 2021 — has put big chunks of the population in danger and left millions without electricity or water for long periods.
These calamities also served as motivation for a researcher at The University of Texas at Austin to refocus her work on innovations that can help communities respond to severe weather events. Her latest project is a mug-sized device that can quickly clean water using a small jolt of electricity to fish out bacterial cells. In lab experiments, the device was able to remove 99.997% of E. coli bacteria from 2- to 3-ounce samples taken from Waller Creek in Austin in approximately 20 minutes, with the capacity to do more.
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Smart Farming Platform Improves Crop Yields, Minimizes Pollution
A new farming system developed by researchers at The University of Texas at Austin aims to solve one of the biggest problems in modern agriculture: the overuse of fertilizers to improve crop yields and the resulting chemical runoff that pollutes the world’s air and water.
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Texas Engineer Recognized for Creating More Sustainable Fertilizer
An international research team co-led by Texas Engineer Guihua Yu won the Royal Society of Chemistry’s (RSC) prestigious Materials Chemistry Horizon Prize, an award celebrating groundbreaking developments which push the boundaries of science.
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Eliminating CO2 Emissions from Manufacturing the Goal of Major Research Alliance
An alliance of nine universities, three national labs and 37 companies will tackle one of the biggest hurdles to decarbonizing manufacturing: carbon dioxide emissions from generating process heat.
Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin will play a significant role in the effort that aims to replace the energy source that powers most manufacturing processes, swapping out hydrocarbon fuels for clean electricity – generated through renewable sources such as solar and wind. Doing this could make a major impact, as manufacturing represents more than 30% of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions.
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Researchers Eye New Ways to Prevent Agricultural Pests from Entering U.S.
Anyone who's traveled internationally is familiar with this standard question upon returning: "Did you bring back any fruits or vegetables?" This has to do with a larger effort from the U.S. government to prevent agricultural pests from entering the country within cargo shipments or passenger baggage, potentially threatening the nation's crops.
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New Data Lab to Tackle Oil & Gas Greenhouse Gas Emissions Accounting
The University of Texas at Austin will be home to a new multidisciplinary research and education initiative based in its Cockrell School of Engineering – the Energy Emissions Modeling and Data Lab (EEMDL) – that will address the growing need for accurate, timely, and clear accounting of greenhouse gas emissions across global oil and natural gas supply chains. Data and analysis from this new endeavor will help both public and private institutions develop climate strategies and actions informed by accurate, verified data, identifying opportunities for emissions reductions.
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Space Environmentalist Awarded ‘Genius Grant’ by MacArthur Foundation
Moriba Jah, an astrodynamicist, space environmentalist and aerospace engineer at The University of Texas at Austin, has been awarded a MacArthur Fellowship, often referred to as the “genius grant.” The award recognizes Jah’s work to track and monitor the more than 30,000 human-made objects orbiting the earth.
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Texas Universities Partner to Study Combined Impact of Flooding and Air Pollution in Beaumont-Port Arthur
Four Texas universities, led by The University of Texas at Austin, have been awarded a grant to establish a new research center to study the risks and impacts of flooding and air pollution in a fast-growing part of Southeast Texas. The scientists will focus on the interactions between these two key issues, as well as their potential acceleration under various climate scenarios.