Materials Science Roundup: Energy, Characterization and Manufacturing

A compact roundup of recent developments across energy storage, manufacturing, characterization and processing. Procurement and tools: A new online request system speeds access to portable gas analyzers, while Instron released a 100 kN table model for its 6800 and 3400 universal testing lines. Process control and components: Vapourtec launched an electronically adjustable back-pressure regulator tuned for gas and gas–liquid flows. Ambrell is offering an introductory webinar on induction heating fundamentals. Additive manufacturing and imaging: Real-time experiments at Argonne’s APS tracked metal microstructure evolution during 3D printing, yielding data that can inform thermal management and defect mitigation for aerospace and energy parts. Energy materials: Oxford’s 3D-CAT project targets higher-energy lithium-ion cathodes; Argonne demonstrated an ALD-deposited thin protective coating to improve solid-state battery stability and manufacturability; Monash reported supercapacitor architectures approaching battery-level energy with ultrafast power; new insights clarify failure pathways in wide-band-gap perovskite tandem cells. Materials and processing innovations: Ames Lab’s rare-earth processing tech has been licensed commercially; Topsoe’s Hydroflex® was chosen for renewable diesel production; Tanaka developed a palladium-alloy hydrogen-permeable membrane operable near 300 °C. Instrumentation and software: CRAIC released Lambdafire™ 2.0 for microscale UV‑Vis‑NIR and Raman spectroscopy, and Avery Dennison upgraded RFID inlays with Gen2X-capable Impinj M800 series chips.