One drinking- water bottle could provide enough energy for an entire household in the developing world if Dan Nocera has his way. A chemist from M.I.T. and founder of the company Sun Catalytix, Nocera has developed a cobalt-based catalyst that allows him to store energy the same way plants do: by splitting water. [More]

WASHINGTON, D.C.--At the inaugural summit of ARPA–E, or the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy , no less an august personage than Norman Augustine declared that we were possibly witnessing an inflection point--a turn from old thinking to new. As an aerospace business pioneer, Augustine certainly knows when trajectories change and escape velocities are attained. Indeed, a host of speakers regarded ARPA–E's effort as an Apollo project, a Manhattan project, and Mike Splinter, CEO of Applied Materials, even called for ARPA–E to be part of a potential Marshall Plan for energy--a road map to a future of clean power, complete with the Hoover Dam of solar, or the like. [More]

In the last month, a professor of toxicology at Saint Louis University has seen nearly 30 cases involving teenagers who were experiencing hallucinations, severe agitation, elevated heart rate and blood pressure, vomiting and, in some cases, tremors and seizures. All of these teens had smoked a dangerous, yet legal substance known as K2 or "fake weed."

Researchers have demonstrated a new microfluidic sorting device that rapidly analyzes millions of biological reactions. Smaller than an iPod Nano, the device analyzes reactions a 1,000-times faster and uses 10 million-fold less volumes of reagent than conventional state-of-the-art robotic methods. The scientists anticipate that the invention could reduce screening costs by 1 million-fold and make directed evolution more commonplace in the lab.

Coffee drinkers may be less likely to be hospitalized for heart rhythm disturbances, according to a new study. The researchers note the findings may be surprising because patients frequently report palpitations after drinking coffee.

Freezing a cancer kills it in its place, and also appears to generate an immune response that helps stop the cancer's spread, leading to improved survival rates over surgery, according to a new study in mice.

Scientists have achieved another important milestone in the international quest to artificially produce insect silk.

A new study estimates the total economic impact of foodborne illness across the U.S. to be a combined $152 billion annually.

The more mysteries that scientists unlock, the more opportunities emerge for the next generation of researchers to transform newfound knowledge into tomorrow's breakthroughs that serve society. The Lemelson–M.I.T. Program recognized several potential breakthroughs Wednesday in awarding four of its $30,000 Lemelson–M.I.T. Student Prizes to those from California Institute of Technology (Caltech), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.), Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (R.P.I.), and the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (U.I.U.C.). [More]

A new study suggests that the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) is a brain region that may help people to control their emotional reactions to negative facial expressions from their romantic partners.