Physicists in the Netherlands have built a heat engine that might be the tiniest ever created. Based on “piezoresistive” silicon, and smaller than a typical biological cell, the engine could find ...

Physicists led by Johannes Roßnagel at the University of Mainz in Germany, the single atom engine is about as efficient as your car at transforming the changing temperature into mechanical energy.

As the world battles rising inflation, a cost-of-living crisis, climate change and more, it’s clear that the fossil-fueled status quo is not working. Fossil fuels may have seemed like the crutch we ...

Nelson Ireson June 6, 2008 Comment Now! Novel technologies to improve the efficiency of existing vehicles and combustion processes are the quickest route to improved fuel mileage. Hybrid cars are ...

When Mickael Perrin started out on his scientific career 12 years ago, he had no way of knowing he was conducting research in an area that would be attracting wide public interest only a few years ...

Researchers at MIT have built a highly efficient thermophotovoltaic cell that, when paired with renewable resources, efficiently converts incoming photons—particles of light—to electricity. It’s an ...

Scientists are working on a heat engine that consists of just a single ion. Such a nano-heat engine could be far more efficient than, for example, a car engine or a coal-fired power plant. Scientists ...

One famous limit of thermodynamics is that heat engines, like steam engines and internal combustion engines, must be less efficient than a Carnot heat engine (a heat engine cycle designed by French ...