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Grabbing water from the air: NUS researchers develop advanced aerogels for autonomous atmospheric water harvesting

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2 years ago

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An inventive, energy-efficient solution to combat the escalating global freshwater crisis

SINGAPORE, Dec. 18, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — The world is on the brink of a freshwater crisis. Estimations indicate that by 2025, half of the world’s population may reside in areas facing water scarcity. In response to this challenge, researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) have developed a novel aerogel designed to enhance the efficiency of atmospheric water harvesting.

This development, led by Associate Professor TAN Swee Ching from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering under the College of Design and Engineering at NUS, offers a practical solution to the pressing issue of freshwater scarcity, particularly in arid regions.

The aerogel is capable of absorbing moisture from the air up to about 5.5 times its weight, maintaining its performance across a wide range of humidity levels, and effective even in conditions as low as 20 per cent relative humidity, making it suitable for diverse environments. Demonstrating the aerogel’s applicability, the research team has integrated it into a solar-driven, autonomous atmospheric water generator that efficiently collects and releases freshwater without requiring external energy sources.

Tapping into the atmosphere

The Earth’s atmosphere holds an estimated 13,000 trillion litres of water — representing an untapped reservoir that could potentially alleviate water scarcity across many arid and drought-prone regions across the globe. However, the challenge has always been to efficiently convert water vapour into a usable resource, considering the variability of atmospheric conditions and the energy demands of current technologies.

Sorption-based atmospheric water harvesting (SAWH) employs sorbents to extract water from the air, presenting a low-energy, easy-to-operate solution applicable across diverse environments, including regions with limited resources. Despite its potential, SAWH faces challenges with conventional sorbents such as activated alumina, silica gels and zeolites, which either have inadequate water uptake or require high temperatures for water release. Although newer sorbents, including hygroscopic salts and metal-organic frameworks, improve upon these aspects, they struggle with issues like deliquescence and agglomeration, which compromise their efficiency and water sorption capacity. Additionally, SAWH devices are generally incapable of supporting more than one water capture-release cycle daily, limiting their utility for continuous and large-scale freshwater production.

Addressing these limitations, the NUS researchers tapped into their creativity to craft a more adaptable and energy-efficient material for SAWH. By converting magnesium chloride into a super hygroscopic magnesium complex and incorporating it into aerogels composed of sodium alginate and carbon nanotubes, they developed a composite aerogel that overcomes the drawbacks of previous technologies.

Like a sponge, the aerogel absorbs water vapour directly from the air into its porous structure, where it condenses and is stored until needed. When exposed to sunlight or a slight increase in ambient temperature (around 50 deg C), the aerogel releases the stored water as fresh, liquid water. The process is facilitated by the aerogel’s unique composition, which combines the moisture-attracting properties of the magnesium complex with the thermal properties of carbon nanotubes — enabling rapid water absorption and release.

Key properties of the aerogel include its high water uptake capacity — about 5.5 times its weight at 95 per cent relative humidity and 27 per cent of its weight at 20 per cent relative humidity, typical of desert climates. Moreover, its robust structure allows for repeated use without a loss in efficiency. It is also cost-efficient to produce — raw materials necessary for producing one square metre of the aerogel cost only US$2.

“The aerogel exhibits rapid absorption/desorption kinetics with 12 cycles per day at 70 per cent relative humidity, equivalent to a water yield of 10 litres per kilogramme of aerogel per day,” said Assoc Prof Tan. “Carbon nanotubes play a crucial role in boosting the aerogel’s photothermal conversion efficiency, enabling quicker water release with minimal energy consumption.”

From concept to reality

The researchers have also designed and constructed a fully solar-driven, autonomous atmospheric water generator that incorporates two layers of the novel aerogel. Each layer alternately engages in the water absorption/desorption cycle, operating without any external energy input. This setup showcases the aerogel’s practicality for facilitating continuous freshwater production — a feature beneficial in underdeveloped regions or areas lacking necessary clean-water infrastructure.

Potential applications of this technology are vast, encompassing evaporative cooling and energy harvesting to smart sensing and urban agriculture. The team has filed a patent for their technology.

The NUS researchers are looking forward to collaborating with local farms and industry partners alike to advance their research and commercialise their technology.

Read more at: https://news.nus.edu.sg/advanced-aerogels-for-autonomous-atmospheric-water-harvesting/

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SOURCE National University of Singapore

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Mission Critical Partners Announces Launch of its Justice Integration Hub in Support of the City of New Orleans

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33 minutes ago

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October 27, 2026

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The $30 million ARPA-funded initiative connects public-safety and justice agencies, accelerates case processing and improves service to the community.

NEW ORLEANS, Oct. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ — Mission Critical Partners today announced the launch of its Justice Integration Hub in support of the city of New Orleans’ Justice Technology Modernization Program (JTMP). JTMP is a multiyear initiative that replaced several decades-old systems with a unified, cloud-based platform designed to improve public safety and access to justice by streamlining operations and strengthening transparency across the city and Orleans Parish criminal-justice ecosystem.

“The Justice Integration Hub is not just a technology milestone; it’s a fundamental shift in how justice is delivered,” said Darrin Reilly, president and CEO, Mission Critical Partners.

The Justice Integration Hub facilitates the seamless flow of information throughout the Parish’s complex criminal-justice ecosystem. Funded through a $30 million allocation from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), JTMP represents one of the most comprehensive justice technology overhauls in the country, modernizing and transforming more than 40 years of legacy infrastructure. The program integrates the area’s entire criminal justice ecosystem — including the New Orleans Police Department, Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office and Justice Center, District Attorney, Public Defender, Criminal District Court, and Clerk of Court — into a single, connected environment.

“The integration hub fundamentally changes how our justice agencies work together,” said Nathaniel Weaver, JTMP director. “Instead of information stopping at the boundaries between agencies, it can move securely in real time, allowing people to spend less time reentering data and more time making the decisions that move cases forward.”

From Fragmentation to Real-Time Coordination

For years, criminal-justice agencies in New Orleans and Orleans Parish operated on outdated, siloed systems that limited collaboration, slowed case processing, and created cross-department inefficiencies.

The Justice Enterprise Hub is built on Microsoft Azure and leverages a standardized enterprise data model aligned with national data-sharing models. A secure integration hub enables real-time data sharing across agencies, ensuring that critical information is accessible when and where it is needed.

Immediate Impact Across the Community

The Justice Enterprise Hub already is helping to deliver measurable improvements:

Patrol officers now have additional hours each week to spend in New Orleans communities and respond to emergencies due to more efficient digital arrest-processing workflows.Data sharing from the jail to the court facilitates automated creation of cases and scheduling of court appearances, saving approximately 6,000 hours of time clerks would spend on data entry.Faster information sharing between agencies is helping reduce hearing delays, streamline inmate transport coordination, and improve overall justice system efficiency. This significantly reduces incarceration costs and generates measurable operational savings.

A Foundation for the Future of Justice

With the core platform now fully operational, New Orleans and Orleans Parish are positioned to build on this foundation with advanced capabilities, including AI-assisted case processing, digital evidence management, and expanded state-level data integration.

“The Justice Integration Hub is not just a technology milestone; it’s a fundamental shift in how justice is delivered,” said Darrin Reilly, MCP’s president and CEO. “New Orleans and Orleans Parish now have a nation-leading, scalable, and future-ready system that enables agencies to work together more effectively and collaboratively to better serve the public. We look forward to bringing this solution to more communities across the nation.”

The system was implemented in four phases, following a competitive nationwide process that selected Mission Critical Partners and Major Services, a New Orleans-based IT consulting firm, to oversee JTMP’s development, implementation, and coordinated go-live activities across all participating agencies. Those four phases went live in succession, between November 2025 and April 2026.

About Mission Critical Partners (MCP)

Mission Critical Partners (MCP) is a leading provider of data integration, consulting, network, and cybersecurity solutions specializing in transforming mission-critical communications networks into integrated ecosystems that improve outcomes in the public-safety, justice, healthcare, transportation, and utility markets. Our comprehensive experience and vendor-agnostic approach help us develop modernized solutions that maximize value, improve efficiency, and mitigate risk. Additional information and career opportunities are available at MissionCriticalPartners.com.

Media Contact

Morgan Sava, Mission Critical Partners, 1 608-658-8858, rscarpino@pipitone.com, https://www.missioncriticalpartners.com/

View original content:https://www.prweb.com/releases/mission-critical-partners-announces-launch-of-its-justice-integration-hub-in-support-of-the-city-of-new-orleans-302920918.html

SOURCE Mission Critical Partners

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MadeAi Launches Dossier Expert, Bringing Agentic AI to Formulary and Value Dossier Development

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33 minutes ago

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October 27, 2026

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New AI-powered solution transforms dossier creation and maintenance with source-level traceability, cross-functional collaboration, and up to 70% faster authoring and updates

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Oct. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ — MadeAi™, a leader in AI-enabled evidence synthesis and life sciences solutions, today announced the launch of MadeAi Dossier Expert, a new AI-powered solution designed to transform how pharmaceutical and life sciences organizations create, review, and maintain formulary and value dossiers.

Traditionally, developing AMCP dossiers, global value dossiers, and health technology assessment (HTA) submissions requires months of coordination across HEOR, Clinical, Market Access, and Medical Writing teams. Evidence is dispersed across multiple sources, citations require extensive manual verification, and updates often trigger lengthy rounds of rewriting and review.

Dossier Expert replaces this fragmented process with a living, evidence-linked document that evolves as the underlying science changes.

Built to address one of the most time-consuming challenges facing Market Access and HEOR teams, Dossier Expert brings evidence management, AI-assisted authoring, citation verification, and cross-functional collaboration into a single, continuously updated environment.

From Static Documents to Living Evidence

Unlike traditional dossier authoring approaches that focus primarily on accelerating initial drafts, Dossier Expert is designed to streamline the entire dossier lifecycle—from first creation through ongoing evidence updates.

Key capabilities include:

AI-Powered Dossier Generation: Create structured AMCP, HTA, and value dossiers using customizable templates and AI-generated, evidence-grounded content.One-Click Citation Verification: Trace every AI-generated claim directly to its source document, with the supporting passage highlighted for immediate verification.Intelligent Evidence Updates: Automatically identify sections affected by changes in underlying evidence and selectively regenerate outdated content without overwriting human edits.Integrated Evidence Hub: Organize and connect indexed source materials directly to relevant dossier sections.Integrated MadeAi-LR: Access AI-enabled literature review directly for in-platform literature review support.Seamless Collaboration: Enable HEOR, Clinical, Market Access, and Medical Writing teams to work within one document, with built-in commenting, assignments, approvals, and version control.Flexible, Submission-Ready Outputs: Export approved dossiers to Word or PDF.

Accelerating Market Access Without Compromising Scientific Rigor

Dossier Expert is designed to deliver up to 70% faster dossier authoring and updates, while reducing the manual effort associated with evidence verification, document management, and recurring revisions.

“Creating a dossier is only part of the challenge. Keeping it scientifically current, fully traceable, and aligned across multiple stakeholders is where organizations lose enormous amounts of time,” said Gaugarin Oliver, Founder and CEO of MadeAi. “With Dossier Expert, we’re moving beyond AI-generated first drafts to a fundamentally different model: a living dossier that connects every claim to its evidence, identifies what needs updating, and enables experts to focus on scientific judgment rather than document administration.”

By combining AI-powered efficiency with human oversight and transparent source verification, Dossier Expert helps life sciences organizations accelerate evidence communication while maintaining the rigor required for payer and HTA engagement.

Learn more about Dossier Expert at www.madeai.com.

About MadeAi

MadeAi™ is an award-winning AI-native evidence synthesis and life sciences solutions platform designed to help pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical device organizations accelerate evidence generation and scientific communication. Combining advanced agentic AI capabilities with human expertise, MadeAi supports workflows across HEOR, Market Access, Medical Affairs, and RWE, delivering greater efficiency, transparency, and scientific rigor.

Media Contact

Meghan Oates-Zalesky, MadeAi, 1 617 435 2470, meghan.oates@madeai.com, www.madeai.com

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prweb.com/releases/madeai-launches-dossier-expert-bringing-agentic-ai-to-formulary-and-value-dossier-development-302920940.html

SOURCE MadeAi

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Peloton Launches Peloton Broker to Streamline Early-Stage Land Acquisition for Energy Projects

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33 minutes ago

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October 27, 2026

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New tract-based pre-leasing tool joins the
Land Data Management solution in the Peloton Platform

CALGARY, AB, Oct. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Peloton, a provider of energy data management software, today announced the launch of Peloton Broker, a tract-based pre-leasing management tool built for energy projects. Peloton Broker gives brokers, consultants, land departments, and legal teams one place to handle ownership discovery, negotiation tracking, and title curative work, so they can move from prospect to signed lease without re-entering data or juggling separate systems.

Peloton Broker is part of Peloton’s Land Data Management solution in the Peloton Platform, alongside LandView, LandView Map, and Peloton Dashboards. It extends Peloton’s trusted foundation to the earliest stage of land acquisition, with pre-leasing work carrying straight into agreement-based lease management in LandView.

“The pre-leasing stage has always been where land data is most scattered, with ownership research in one place, negotiation notes in another, and title issues surfacing late,” said James Hatcher, Product Manager – Land Data Management at Peloton. “Peloton Broker brings that work into the Peloton Platform from day one, so land teams start every lease with a complete picture and the rest of the organization gets land data it can trust.”

Built for the start of the lease lifecycle

Peloton Broker helps land teams at oil and gas operators and renewable energy developers:

Track ownership at the tract level, covering both surface and mineral rightsManage negotiations in integrated workflows that record every offer, contact, and status changeCatch title concerns early with title curative support, before they hold up executionWork from the map with GIS-driven prospect management connected to LandView MapKeep audit-ready records with full traceability from first contact to executed lease

Connected across the Peloton Platform

The Peloton Platform is a SaaS solution hosted by Microsoft Azure that brings well, production, and land data together in one environment. With Peloton Broker on the platform, customers get:

A single source of truth. Land, operations, and finance teams work from the same accurate, up-to-date information, with master data such as business associates, wells, and units shared across products.Linked lifecycles. Land data ties into well and production data in WellView and ProdView, and integrates with third-party ERP and financial systems.Enterprise-grade security, backed by Peloton’s SOC 1 and SOC 2 Type 2 certifications.

Peloton Broker is available now. To learn more, visit peloton.com/products/land-data-management/broker.

About Peloton

Headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, and founded in 1991, Peloton created the energy industry’s original data management solution, and it remains the standard today. With more than three decades of industry expertise and over 700 clients globally, Peloton offers software across the well, production, and land lifecycles. The Peloton Platform brings all three together in one integrated SaaS environment, hosted by Microsoft Azure.

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/peloton-launches-peloton-broker-to-streamline-early-stage-land-acquisition-for-energy-projects-302921122.html

SOURCE Peloton Computer Enterprises Ltd.

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