All posts tagged: Cell

Georgia is about to have the biggest solar cell factory in US history

Georgia is about to have the biggest solar cell factory in US history

Published by skeptic

Photo: Qcells Solar giant Qcells has started making solar cells at its Cartersville, Georgia, factory, and it’s on track to become the largest solar cell factory in US history by Q3 2026. The US has been heavily dependent on imported solar components for years, leaving developers exposed to tariff swings and supply chain disruptions. Qcells’ Cartersville is a direct bet against that. This isn’t just another factory; it’s the only place in the country where every major piece of a solar panel – from ingot to finished module – gets made under one roof. The module assembly side is already running at full capacity, turning out 16,700 panels a day. “Producing the first solar cells at Cartersville is a milestone for Qcells and for American manufacturing,” said Andy Park, global CEO of Qcells. “A dependable domestic supply chain doesn’t just create thousands of good-paying jobs; it gives our customers greater certainty on price, supply, and tariffs, and a product they can trust from start to finish.” Advertisement – scroll for more content The numbers are …

Cell carriers are using AI, drones and ‘cows’ to respond to hurricanes : NPR

Cell carriers are using AI, drones and ‘cows’ to respond to hurricanes : NPR

Published by Sam Flores

Residents make phone calls in their neighborhood after heavy rains from hurricane Helene caused record flooding and damage on September 28, 2024 in Asheville, North Carolina. Melissa Sue Gerrits/Getty Images North America hide caption toggle caption Melissa Sue Gerrits/Getty Images North America Anthony Leone and his wife, Corinne Saunders, have already started watching the weather. In a few weeks, they’ll be filling coolers and plugging in generators. He has lived in North Carolina’s Outer Banks for more than 20 years. So he’s familiar with this routine that precedes the inevitable — hurricane season. As for their cell phones? “We just plan ahead to not use [them].” Hurricane season runs from June to November, and the National Weather Service said in May it’s predicting below-normal activity in the Atlantic region for the first time since 2015. But the chance for at least one very powerful storm remains. Even though there may be slightly less hurricane activity this year, high winds and rain can still interrupt the power supply stationary cell towers rely on. As a result, …

New material stores four magnetic states per cell – exponentially increasing memory storage

New material stores four magnetic states per cell – exponentially increasing memory storage

Published by Jenni Sidey

Every text message, photograph, and saved file still comes down to a simple bargain: information is stored as either 0 or 1. That binary system built modern computing, and for decades engineers kept improving it by shrinking the transistors that carry and store those bits. That long run is getting harder to sustain. As components approach physical limits, researchers are looking for other ways to handle information, including methods that do not rely only on electric charge. One of the most closely watched alternatives is spintronics, a field that uses another property of electrons, their magnetism, to store and process data. A new study from researchers at Institut Laue-Langevin pushes that idea in an unusual direction. Instead of building memory around two stable magnetic states, the work shows that a single crystal can hold four. In principle, that could let one memory unit represent four values rather than just 0 and 1, opening a path toward denser forms of digital storage. The material at the center of the work is a magnetoelectric crystal called LiNi0.8Fe0.2PO4, …

Microgripper developed for precise assembly of fragile cell spheroids for tissue engineering

Microgripper developed for precise assembly of fragile cell spheroids for tissue engineering

Published by skeptic

A team at Purdue University have designed a mobile microgripper (MMG) that can handle fragile cell spheroids with controlled force and high spatial precision. Spheroids have become integral to tissue engineering, as they can replicate biological interactions between cells and the surrounding matrix- but they are exceedingly fragile, meaning handling can be problematic. “Other techniques for cell spheroid bioassembly can affect the tissue construct and/or apply limited manipulation forces,” said Dr David Cappelleri, professor of mechanical engineering and biomedical engineering at Purdue. “The force-sensing MMG … addresses these current issues by allowing the safe bioassembly of different spheroids into a single construct,” he said. But in a new study, a team at Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, have created a tiny robotic gripper, that can manipulate spheroids without causing tissue damage. The robot uses a magnetic microscopic claw mechanism The wireless mobile microrobot gripper consists of two articulated arms connected by a hinge, allowing controlled closure to grasp the spheroid cells with minimal force, operating under magnetic actuation. External magnetic fields enabled both movement of …

Autism genetics linked to reduced brain cell fiber density

Autism genetics linked to reduced brain cell fiber density

Published by José Betancourt

Individuals who carry common genetic variants associated with autism tend to have lower density in the brain’s microscopic wiring, regardless of whether they actually have an autism diagnosis. The research reveals a shared genetic architecture between the likelihood of autism and the microscopic development of the brain. The study was published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry. Autism is a condition influenced by a vast pool of genetic variations spread across human DNA. Each minor genetic difference has only a tiny effect on its own, but combined, they shape a person’s underlying likelihood of developing the condition. This type of genetic architecture is called polygenic inheritance. Researchers have documented structural brain differences in autistic individuals for many years. However, much less is known about how the multitude of genes linked to autism might affect the physical structure of the brain in the broader public. Genetic traits often influence physical characteristics across an entire population on a sliding scale. To answer these questions, scientists look for subtle patterns in large databases of health records. Yuanjun Gu and …

Is stem cell therapy about to transform medicine and reverse ageing?

Is stem cell therapy about to transform medicine and reverse ageing?

Published by skeptic

Stem cells could make good on the promise of partial reprogramming for rejuvenation therapies KATERYNA KON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/Alamy I’ve covered the ageing field for many years and seen a lot of promising rejuvenation therapies get hyped up then fall flat on their faces. Ground zero for this repeated cycle was resveratrol, a natural compound once touted by biotech company Sirtris Pharmaceuticals as a miracle anti-ageing drug. In 2008, pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline bought the company for $720 million, only to pull the plug five years later after the compound turned out to be a dud. Similar disappointments have bedevilled caloric restriction, drugs targeting the ageing master switch MTOR and senolytics designed to clear out zombie cells that are a key driver of ageing. So when I heard about the first clinical trial of a new class of rejuvenation drugs, I tried not to get too excited. But the more I looked, the more I started to think, maybe this time it’s different. Make a mental note of “partial reprogramming”, because it could be the one that …

Sitting in a jail cell, alone and hopeless, a man’s life is suddenly changed : NPR

Sitting in a jail cell, alone and hopeless, a man’s life is suddenly changed : NPR

Published by Sam Flores

Jay (not pictured) found himself alone and hopeless in a jail cell when a fellow inmate’s unexpected words of comfort changed his life. Irkham Khalid/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Irkham Khalid/Getty Images When Jay was 22 years old, he was a self-described loner. In this story, he is being identified by his nickname to allow himself to speak candidly about the following experience and his mental health. He says the few people he did hang out with at the time had questionable morals.  ”I chose my friends poorly, and your friends have a tendency to rub off on you. And so I started making poor decisions,” Jay said. One evening, when he and his friends were out drinking, someone suggested they should try to break into the chemistry building on his college campus. Most of the group shrugged the suggestion off, deeming it impossible, but Jay was convinced he could pull it off. “The next night I made a plan of how to do it, and I did it,” Jay remembered. “And I didn’t …

4.5 GW: A big US solar cell factory is coming to South Carolina

4.5 GW: A big US solar cell factory is coming to South Carolina

Published by skeptic

Photo: Heliene Suniva is planning a major expansion in US solar manufacturing, with a new 4.5-gigawatt (GW) solar cell factory coming to Laurens, South Carolina. The company says the facility is expected to open in Q2 2027. Once it’s online, Suniva’s total US solar cell capacity will top 5.5 GW annually, including its existing factory in metro Atlanta. That would make it the largest merchant solar cell manufacturer in the US. The new plant will be a 620,000-square-foot facility backed by more than $350 million in investment. It’s expected to create more than 550 jobs in advanced manufacturing and clean energy. Suniva manufactures high-efficiency monocrystalline silicon solar cells. The company has been around since 2007, when it spun out of US Department of Energy-funded research at Georgia Tech. It filed for bankruptcy in 2017, but made a comeback in 2023. Advertisement – scroll for more content The company is leaning hard into domestic manufacturing at a time when supply chains – especially for solar – remain heavily global. CEO Tony Etnyre said, “Solar energy is …