Highlights
C&EN: Gas looping boosts efficiency of carbon nanotube production
22 December 2025Methane pyrolysis reactor recycles process gases to improve output of nanotubes and hydrogen.
C&EN: Enhanced rock weathering shows little climate benefit in large trial
18 December 20253-year Swiss study underscores the importance of site selection to maximize CO2 sequestration.
Nature Nanotechnology: Brain–computer interfaces race to the clinic
12 December 2025Advances in materials science, microelectronics and semiconductor manufacturing are helping these devices to benefit patients.
C&EN: Europium complex harvests ambient energy to power minirobots
20 November 2025Inchworms can stroll for hours using scraps of heat from the environment.
Nature Biotechnology: Chemistry Nobel materials in the clinic
14 November 2025Human trials using metal–organic frameworks for drug delivery are underway, but challenges remain.
TESTIMONIALS
“As an editor and reporter, Mark Peplow is fast, accurate, and versatile. He covers science policy and pure research with equal passion, and his writing combines a scientist’s precision with a journalist’s verve.” Tim Appenzeller
Former Chief Magazine Editor at Nature, now News Editor at Science
"Mark guided me through some of the most challenging stories I've written. These are pieces I might not have attempted were it not for his steady editorial hand." Linda Nordling
Freelance Journalist, South Africa
“Working with Mark is never anything other than a pleasure. He is the kind of editor that writers hope for: able to identify what needs fixing and what doesn’t, bringing to bear a wealth of knowledge, always clear, prompt and easy to talk with. Much of that comes from being a splendid writer himself.”
Philip Ball
Freelance Science Writer
Category Archives: Highlights
Engineering: Controversy Clouds Real Progress in Superconductor Research
Debunked claims of room-temperature superconductivity obscure recent advances.
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Nature Biotechnology: Next-generation psychedelics: should new agents skip the trip?
Companies attract venture funding for redesigned psychedelic drugs and notch clinical trial milestones.
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Nature: Element from the periodic table’s far reaches coaxed into elusive compound
Chemists achieve synthetic feat with radioactive promethium for the first time.
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C&EN’s Talented 12: Chibueze Amanchukwu
This electrochemist invents new electrolytes to boost batteries.
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C&EN’s Talented 12: Julian West
This organic chemist harnesses the catalytic power of iron with light.
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Nature: Meet ‘goldene’: this gilded cousin of graphene is also one atom thick
Sheets of gold might find use as catalysts, or in light-sensing devices.
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C&EN: Mechanochemistry strips cargo molecules from a loaded rotaxane
Using polymer strands to pull a ring along an axle could release repair molecules in self-healing materials.
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C&EN: Machine learning improves beer flavor
Algorithm correlates online reviews with chemical profiles of hundreds of beers, providing a roadmap to enhance taste.
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C&EN: Scorching heat turns MOF into discerning hydrogenation catalyst
By selectively turning alkynes into alkenes, the porous material could pave the way for more efficient purification of polymer feedstocks.
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C&EN: Photochemistry unleashes a one-two radical punch for efficient ring synthesis
Iridium and nickel catalysts cooperate to install nonaromatic rings in drug molecules.
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