New discoveries and inventions that could change how we live, explained clearly. These stories cover first-of-their-kind results from universities and companies, what makes them important, and what still has to happen before they reach the real world. Each one links to the field of engineering behind it and the routes into that field. If a story sparks your interest, the related guides show what to study and where it could lead.
Energy & Environment
Pacific Fusion has completed four successful pulsed power fusion tests at Sandia's Z facility, demonstrating a target design that could unlock a third path to commercial fusion energy.
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Manufacturing
RMIT University engineers have created the world's first floating titanium metamaterial, a 3D-printed composite 70% stronger than stainless steel that bobs on…
Careers Manufacturing, Automation
Energy & Environment
Endurance Energy has generated electricity from a geothermal well drilled 1,500 metres beneath the Pacific Ocean, the first offshore geothermal power system…
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Energy & Environment
Mazama Energy's superhot rock geothermal wells drill three miles down to tap 400°C heat, with each well generating 15MW of round-the-clock clean…
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Aerospace, Defence & Marine
University of Colorado researchers have solved two key limitations of phononic subsurface technology, bringing vibration-based aircraft drag reduction closer to real-world flight.
Careers Aerospace, Mechanical
Electronics & Communications
NC State researchers built a teardrop-shaped soft robot from liquid crystal elastomer that jumps 80 times its body height under infrared light…
Careers Electronic, Electrical
Energy & Environment
Five peer-reviewed papers confirm the physics behind Commonwealth Fusion Systems' ARC compact fusion reactor, designed to power 280,000 homes.
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Manufacturing
A new purple radiative cooling fabric reflects 88% of sunlight and stays cooler than white cotton, challenging assumptions about colour and heat.
Careers Manufacturing, Automation
Energy & Environment
Researchers at KIT have built the first elastocaloric cooling system driven entirely by heat, using nickel-titanium shape memory films to convert waste…
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Health
Cellulose hydrogel wearable sensors made from cotton pulp kept detecting motion at -25°C for 168 hours, enabling cold-weather flexible electronics.
Careers Biomedical
Energy & Environment
A new stainless steel green hydrogen alloy, SS-H2, resists corrosion up to 1700mV using a counter-intuitive manganese passivation layer.
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Electronics & Communications
An atomically thin transistor breakthrough from NYCU and TSMC uses a 0.42nm interface layer to push chip performance beyond today's silicon limits.
Careers Electronic, Electrical
Manufacturing
Illinois engineers built the first 3D thermal cloak, a printed lattice that hides objects from infrared cameras by redirecting heat around them.
Careers Manufacturing, Automation
Energy & Environment
German engineers ran a compressorless hydrogen turbine for 303 seconds, beating NASA's record and cutting the energy lost to compression.
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Manufacturing
Purdue engineers created a cobalt aluminum alloy with strength 10 times greater than steel by redesigning the metal at the nanoscale.
Careers Manufacturing, Automation
Health
A rice-sized biodegradable cancer implant delivers immunotherapy drugs directly into tumours, eliminating cancer in 60% of preclinical models.
Careers Biomedical
Chemicals
Scientists embedded engineered bacteria into plastic that fully self-destructs in 6 days, leaving no microplastics. Discover how this living material works.
Careers Chemical
Energy & Environment
A flowing zinc slurry battery ran for 5,128 hours with 99.94% efficiency in lab tests, offering a new approach to long-duration renewable…
Careers Electrical, Chemical
Electronics & Communications
Max Planck researchers solve the solid state battery dendrite problem, revealing lithium cracks ceramics through pressure, not electron leakage.
Careers Electronic, Electrical
Health
Oxford Nanopore wins the 2026 MacRobert Award for its portable DNA sequencing technology used on the ISS and in field disease outbreaks.
Careers Biomedical
Energy & Environment
Tohoku University's graphene-COF interlayer keeps a lithium sulfur battery stable for 1,000 cycles at 674 Wh/kg, solving the polysulfide shuttle problem.
Careers Electrical, Chemical