The Frontiers Planet Prize, the world’s largest science competition to enhance planetary health by fast-tracking innovative research, has announced National Champions from 19 different countries who now advance to the International competition, which will award three winners $1M each to scale up their research. Suzanne Tank and co-authors from the Arctic Great Rivers Observatory (ArcticGRO), a multinational project founded at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL), were recognized for their publication, “Recent trends in the chemistry of major northern rivers signal widespread Arctic change,” published in Nature Geosciences.

The less intensively you manage the soil, the better the soil can function. Such as not ploughing as often or using more grass-clover mixtures as cover crops. These are the conclusions from a research team led by the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW). Surprisingly, it applies to both conventional and organic farming. These important insights for making agriculture more sustainable are published in the scientific journal Science today. ‘It offers clear evidence to help farmers manage soils better.’

Three University of Texas at Arlington faculty members were recognized for their research and creative contributions as part of the faculty research honors. J. Ping Liu, professor of physics, received the University Award for Distinguished Record of Research or Creative Activity. Kyrah Brown, associate professor of kinesiology, and Ben Jones, associate professor of physics, received the University Award for Outstanding Research or Creative Accomplishment.

Assistant professor of chemical engineering Jason Bates wants deeper studies of new catalyst designs before declaring any one of them the next big thing.

A research team led by Prof. YAN Ya from the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in collaboration with scientists from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and the University of Auckland, has developed a highly stable and efficient water oxidation catalyst, marking a major advancement in the field of green hydrogen production via water splitting technology.

Researchers from Sun Yat-sen University (SYSU) and the Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP) have developed a novel top veto tracker system for the Taishan Antineutrino Observatory (TAO) experiment. Comprising 160 plastic scintillator (PS) modules with optimized wavelength shifting fiber (WLS-fiber) arrangements and silicon photomultipliers, the system offers enhanced light yield and muon detection efficiency.