Nanozymes are tiny, engineered substances that mimic the catalytic properties of natural enzymes, and they serve a variety of purposes in biomedicine,  chemical engineering, and environmental applications. They are typically made from inorganic materials, including metal-based elements, which makes them unsuitable for many purposes due to their toxicity and high production costs.

Researchers analyzed the financial and environmental costs and benefits of four biofuels crops used to produce sustainable aviation fuels in the U.S. They found that each feedstock — corn stover, energy sorghum, miscanthus or switchgrass — performed best in a specific region of the rainfed United States. Their study will help growers and policymakers select the feedstocks most suited to meeting goals like reducing production costs, lowering greenhouse gas emissions and building soil carbon stocks. 

Creating fertilizers from organic waste can help reduce the consumption of fossil fuels and promote sustainable production. One way of doing this is through hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL), which converts biomass into biocrude oil through a high-temperature, high-pressure process.

Illinois has made transitioning to clean energy a major priority in recent years with the passage of the Future Energy Jobs Act (FEJA) in 2016 and the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA) in 2021. Both pieces of legislation prioritize an equitable transition, aiming to avoid and address historical wrongdoings associated with environmental injustice. 

Urban agriculture has the potential to improve food security through local, efficient, and sustainable food production. Examples of urban food systems include hydroponics, where plants grow in a nutrient solution without soil, and aquaponics, which combines hydroponics with raising fish in tanks.

Organic farming can support soil microorganisms that promote plant defenses and reduce insect pests. But not all organic practices are equally beneficial for soil microbes, and it’s important to understand farmer motivations in order to encourage the adoption of microbiome-supportive efforts.

The Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment has awarded $30,000 in seed funding to Andrew Hultgren, assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, and others for an interdisciplinary proposal examining the economic and human health effects of exposure to wildfire smoke on a broad scale. The project aims to inform policy related to climate change.

Following decades of decline, even fewer birds will darken North American skies by the end of the century, according to a new analysis by scientists at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

As greenhouse gases go, nitrous oxide (N2O) is a doozy. With a global warming potential 273 times that of carbon dioxide, mitigating N2O could make a big difference. But before mitigation can happen, it’s important to understand where the compound is coming from. 

When scientists look at the Earth’s available water for ecosystem services, they don’t just look at precipitation. They must also account for water moving from the ground to the atmosphere, a process known as evapotranspiration (ET). ET includes evaporation from soil and open water pools such as lakes, rivers, and ponds, as well as transpiration from plant leaves.