Researchers from the UPC, the University of Udine (Italy) and the ALBA Synchrotron have discovered a palladium and platinum catalyst, the first to eliminate methane emissions from transport and other human activities to reduce global warming. The study has been recently published in Nature Communications.
A research lead by the company BASF has characterized a new methodology to produce nickel-rich cathode materials used in lithium-ion batteries that optimizes the conventional production process. The proposed model leads to an increase in throughput by a factor of three, representing a considerable increase in the efficiency of future cathode active materials production for battery electric vehicles. The contributions of the MSPD beamline at ALBA have been key in these findings.
An international collaboration led by the University of Zurich has demonstrated a method to control the charge-transfer mechanism arising at the interface between distinct perovskite oxides. X-ray absorption spectroscopy experiments at BOREAS beamline of ALBA facilitated the observation of the engineered charge transfer between the different components of the epitaxial heterostructures. The results have been published in the journal Advanced Materials.
A study by the Sant Joan de Déu Research Institute, ICFO, CIBERER and the ALBA Synchrotron has helped demonstrate that gene therapy can reverse the effects of the mutation that causes the symptoms of congenital muscular dystrophy in patient cells. The mutation, which leads to a disorder in the body's collagen, has been silenced through a genetic editing technique based on the CRISPR/Cas9 system. Experiments at the MISTRAL beamline in ALBA have revealed previously unknown cell damage.Congenital muscular dystrophy is a rare minority disease that mainly affects children and has no treatment.
Researchers from Universitat Politècnica de València, Universidad de La Laguna, Universidad de Cantabria and the ALBA Synchrotron have published a new work on high pressure chemistry in gallium (III) sulphide chalcogenide. In this work, relevant fingerprints (vibrational and structural) of a pressure-induced paralectric to ferroelectric phase transition are shown. This is the first time when a tetradymite-like (R3m) phase has been synthesized and observed experimentally in gallium-based sequichalcogenides. High pressure X-ray diffraction measurements were carried out at MSPD beamline of ALBA.
