Alexis Templeton kneels on a rock in the middle of a spring

Can rocks produce abundant clean energy? New project to explore

Sept. 18, 2023

Geologists at CU Boulder will experiment with injecting water deep below Earth's surface in an effort to stimulate the production of hydrogen gas—a clean-burning fuel that could provide energy for the globe.

ring of dust around a star with small planet in the foreground

An infrared telescope that spans the globe? New grant may make it possible

Sept. 14, 2023

Physicists and engineers at CU Boulder envision infrared astronomy telescopes that may one day span the entire globe—syncing up observations from instruments spread across the continents, or even orbiting Earth, and giving scientists an unprecedented look at phenomena like the birth of new planets.

Illustration showing a sun with radiation impacting three planets surrounded by magnetic fields

New project to probe how planets lose their atmospheres

Sept. 13, 2023

Scientists will develop “worlds in a box” to investigate the phenomenon of atmospheric escape—how some planets, like Earth, hold onto their atmospheres while others, like Mars, don’t.

People walk in front of a building on the CU Boulder campus

Pioneering physics center gets $25M

Sept. 12, 2023

For nearly two decades, physicists at JILA have pioneered record-fast lasers that can fit on a table and have chilled clouds of atoms to just a fraction of a degree above absolute zero. With a new award, their work is just getting started.

3D printing tip places layers of brown paste

3D printing with coffee: Turning used grounds into caffeinated creations

Sept. 8, 2023

Coffee could be the key to reducing 3D printing waste, according to a new study. Researchers with the ATLAS Institute and Department of Computer Science developed a method for 3D printing using a paste made out of old coffee grounds.

Person wearing purple gloves holding a small robot

Tiny, shape-shifting robot can squish itself into tight spaces

Aug. 30, 2023

Imagine a robot that can wedge itself through the cracks in rubble to search for survivors trapped in the wreckage of a collapsed building. Engineers at CU Boulder are moving one step closer to that goal with CLARI, short for Compliant Legged Articulated Robotic Insect.

Vladimir Putin and Yevgeny Prigozhin

What the death of rival Prigozhin means for Putin and the war on Ukraine

Aug. 28, 2023

Russian officials have confirmed the Aug. 23 plane crash in the outskirts of Moscow killed Yevgeny Priogozhin, friend-turned-foe of Russian President Vladimir Putin. CU expert Sarah Wilson Sokhey offers her take on what Prigozhin’s death means for the war in Ukraine and how a coup attempt against Czar Nicholas II in 1907 could provide clues about what will happen next.

Dark craters seen from above on the moon

India just won the race to the moon’s South Pole. Here’s what comes next

Aug. 23, 2023

Marking the latest milestone in a new kind of space race, India's Chandrayaan-3 mission touched down safely on the moon. CU Boulder astrophysicist Jack Burns gives his take on why nations and companies are hurrying to parts of the moon that no Apollo craft ever visited.

People dig in a long along a riverbank as snow falls

Tiny ‘ice mouse’ survived Arctic cold in the age of dinosaurs

Aug. 10, 2023

Roughly 73 million years ago, dinosaurs like tyrannosaurs and hadrosaurs lived among conifer trees in northern Alaska. The region was also home to a much smaller creature—a tiny mammal that weathered months of darkness and freezing temperatures in the winter.

Person's hand presses down on a new 3D "shape display," while a green ball whizzes along its surface.

3D display could soon bring touch to the digital world

July 31, 2023

Engineers at CU Boulder have designed a new, shape-shifting display that can fit on a card table and allows users to draw 3D designs and more.

Pages