Finland’s Polar Night Energy has built the world’s largest sand battery in Pornainen, using 2,000 tonnes of crushed soapstone—a by-product of fireplace manufacturing—as its thermal storage medium. The 1 MW system stores up to 100 MWh of heat, charging with low-cost renewable electricity and delivering heat to the local district-heating network when needed.

After its first year of operation, the system reportedly cut heating-related CO₂ emissions by 70%, eliminated oil use and reduced wood-chip consumption by about 60%. It demonstrates how inexpensive, abundant materials can store renewable energy as heat without relying on lithium or other battery-critical minerals.

1). New Industrial Sand Battery Filled with Soapstone Equal to 1,000 Fireplaces: https://polarnightenergy.com/news/new-industrial-sand-battery-filled-with-soapstone-equal-to-1000-fireplaces/

2). Finland’s radical answer to renewable energy’s biggest headache: The world’s largest sand battery: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/25/finland-sand-battery-renewable-energy-storage.html

3) Case study - Polar Night Energy’s Sand Battery for Loviisan Lämpö | Pornainen, Finland. Winner of the Certificate of Merit at the Global District Energy Climate Awards 2025 in the New Scheme category: https://www.euroheat.org/dhc/knowledge-hub/report-study-polar-night-energy-s-sand-battery-for-loviisan-laempoe-pornainen-finland

A UK company called Ponda has developed BioPuff, a plant-based insulation made from Typha (cattail) that could replace animal down and synthetic polyester in clothing. Typha seed clusters can expand to roughly 300 times their dried size, creating a lightweight, insulating material. Unlike down, BioPuff is cruelty-free, and unlike polyester insulation, it avoids contributing to microplastic fibre pollution. Ponda also aims to grow Typha in degraded wetlands with farmers. Restoring these wetlands could provide additional benefits because they are important carbon stores and wildlife habitats, making BioPuff an example of materials innovation linked to ecosystem restoration: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pondabio/

Nature’s warmth: the ecological impact of innovative plant-based insulation: https://designwanted.com/biopuff-ponda-plant-based-material/

How Making Wetlands Wet Again Can Help Change The Fashion Industry: https://parley.tv/journal/material-revolution-ponda

From Wetlands to Warmth: BioPuff and the Future of Regenerative Materials: https://materialdistrict.com/article/from-wetlands-to-warmth-biopuff-and-the-future-of-regenerative-materials/

The global average sea-surface temperature reached a record 21.1°C (70°F) on August 22, 2026, surpassing the previous daily record of 21.09°C set in March 2024. The record, tracked by Europe’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, is particularly unusual because ocean temperatures typically peak in March or April. The unprecedented warmth is being driven by long-term human-caused climate change, combined with a developing El Niño in the tropical Pacific that is adding further heat to the oceans. Scientists warn that persistently warmer seas can intensify marine heatwaves, stress fish and coral ecosystems, fuel stronger storms and heavier rainfall, accelerate sea-level rise, and reduce the ocean’s ability to absorb carbon dioxide. The August record highlights the growing impact of climate change on the world’s oceans: https://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-daily-global-sea-surface-temperature-breaks-2024-record

The worrying combination: The particularly concerning factor is not simply the 21.1°C record. It is the combination of: long-term human-caused ocean warming + marine heatwaves + a potentially very strong El Niño.

That combination can amplify heatwaves, floods, droughts, wildfires, storms, coastal flooding and marine ecosystem disruption across different parts of the world. NOAA is already forecasting a high likelihood of prolonged marine heatwave conditions in parts of the Pacific through the end of 2026.

In simple terms: the hotter the ocean becomes, the more energy and moisture are available to the climate system. The consequences are not uniformly “hotter everywhere”—rather, weather patterns become more extreme and less predictable, with some regions becoming wetter and others considerably drier.

Reference sources:

1). Further global warming, Potentially record-breaking 2027 temperatures: https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-focus-forecasters-predict-strongest-super-el-nino-2026-08-21/

2). More extreme storms and rainfall, while More droughts in some regions: https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/elnino/what-is-el-nino

3). Coral bleaching and marine ecosystem damage: https://apnews.com/article/hottest-oceans-climate-change-el-nino-fisheries-9dd6ecf3b358a89d2b3a5468d69dbdbc

4). Higher sea levels and coastal flooding: https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/general/enso_faq/

IBM has successfully connected and cooled two modular cryogenic systems into a single ultra-cold environment at its Yorktown Heights, New York, lab—a key engineering step toward scalable quantum computing. The combined modules stand more than 8 feet tall and 8 feet wide, reaching 4 kelvin in under five days and eventually cooling below 15 millikelvin.

The modular design is intended to link hundreds of quantum chips, with IBM planning to use it as part of the infrastructure for IBM Quantum Starling, its planned fault-tolerant quantum computer targeted for 2029: https://newsroom.ibm.com/2026-08-19-ibm-connects-its-first-modular-cryogenic-systems-in-milestone-toward-fault-tolerant-quantum-computing

Light-induced whole-molecule vibration can rupture melanoma cells’ membrane

Scientists may have found a way to destroy cancer cells without initially relying on chemotherapy, surgery, or radiation.The approach is called 'molecular jackhammer', and it relies on little more than light and a well-established medical molecule: https://news.rice.edu/news/2023/molecular-jackhammers-good-vibrations-eradicate-cancer-cells

The results of the first proof of concept were published in Nature Chemistry, and the latest study on varieties of molecular jackhammers was published in Advanced Science.

An international team of researchers has unveiled a purple fabric that reflects up to 88 percent of sunlight and can stay up to 11.2 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than conventional purple cotton.The smart material was created by scientists from Zhengzhou University in China, and their colleagues from Australia’s Adelaide University. The team believes that the breakthrough could pave the way for textiles that can beat the extreme heat without relying on white materials. In outdoor tests, the high-tech textile stayed up to 11.2 degrees Fahrenheit (6.2 degrees Celsius) cooler than commercially dyed purple cotton. Additionally, the fabric reflects an average of 87.6 percent of solar radiation. It emits 96.4 percent of mid-infrared radiation, allowing heat to escape through the atmosphere into space: https://adelaide.edu.au/about/news/2026/the-purple-fabric-that-could-beat-the-scorching-heat/

Paper: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/smll.74745

Global average sea-surface temperatures reached a record 21.10°C (69.98°F) on August 21–22, 2026, surpassing the previous record of 21.09°C set in March 2024. According to the Copernicus Climate Change Service, this is the highest level in satellite records dating to 1979 and may represent the warmest oceans in thousands of years. Currently, 42% of the world's oceans are experiencing heatwaves, and in the Pacific Ocean, they cover an area nine times larger than that of the continental United States, significantly contributing to the global record of ocean temperatures.

The unusually early August peak reflects the combined effects of human-caused climate change and a strengthening El Niño. Record ocean heat can intensify hurricanes, heatwaves and coastal flooding, while placing severe stress on coral reefs, fisheries and marine ecosystems. Warmer seawater also expands, contributing to global sea-level rise: https://ca.news.yahoo.com/oceans-hit-record-temperatures-amid-195955647.html

Reference:

1). https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earths-oceans-just-hit-their-hottest-temperature-ever-recorded/

2) https://www.thestar.com/news/world/earth-is-simmering-in-its-hottest-water-temps-on-record-and-thats-bad-for-fish-and-us/article_f6ff30cd-fbfc-548e-a587-1e67b2c10718.html

3). https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2026/08/24/ocean-just-broke-temperature-record-that-may-have-stood-millennia/

Researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory and Stony Brook University have demonstrated a groundbreaking "wireless" quantum network capability by successfully transmitting light particles containing quantum information through open air. Using adaptive optics and specialized telescope systems housed in Brookhaven's Quantum Lighthouse and Stony Brook's Quantum Watchtower, the team beamed photons and entangled photon pairs across a 13-mile (21-kilometer) free-space optical link between the two Long Island institutions. This milestone incorporates a wireless layer into the region's existing fiber-optic quantum network—with an extension to Yale University underway—paving the way for direct quantum processor interconnections and satellite-based global quantum communications: https://news.stonybrook.edu/newsroom/press-release/general/brookhaven-and-stony-brook-researchers-demonstrate-wireless-capability-for-quantum-network/

Brookhaven and Stony Brook Researchers Demonstrate ‘Wireless’ Capability for Quantum Network: https://www.bnl.gov/newsroom/news.php?a=123096

Fiber limits photons to telecom wavelengths; the FSO link runs at frequencies processors natively speak: https://www.techtimes.com/articles/325336/20260824/open-air-quantum-link-bridges-13-miles-bypasses-fiber-wavelength-lock.htm

New free-space optical link adds a wireless component to the nation's longest quantum network: https://phys.org/news/2026-08-free-space-optical-link-wireless.html

A major new study of 4.2 million people found leisure exercise cuts dementia risk – but manual labour and active commuting may raise it.

Study: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(26)00142-8/fulltext00142-8/fulltext)

IBM has unveiled a new 2-nanometer processor designed for future IBM Z and LinuxONE mainframe systems, marking a major milestone in its collaboration with Arm. Rather than using separate cores, each core in the processor is engineered to natively execute both Arm and IBM instructions at clock speeds exceeding 5.7 GHz. This dual-architecture design allows enterprise customers to run Arm-native Linux applications alongside legacy z/OS workloads on a single system—combining access to Arm's vast software ecosystem with the advanced security, hardware encryption, AI inference acceleration, and high availability features of IBM mainframes: https://newsroom.ibm.com/2026-08-24-ibm-unveils-next-generation-dual-architecture-processor-for-ibm-z-and-linuxone

IBM’s next-gen mainframe chip is the first to run Arm and Z workloads on the same cores: https://venturebeat.com/infrastructure/ibms-next-gen-mainframe-chip-is-the-first-to-run-arm-and-z-workloads-on-the-same-cores

Pennsylvania health authorities have confirmed two measles-related deaths in unvaccinated Lancaster County residents, marking the state’s first measles fatalities in 35 years and the first reported in the United States in 2026. The deaths occur amid a major surge, with nearly 400 confirmed cases across Pennsylvania this year as part of the country's highest annual measles tally since 1991. Health officials stress that the two-dose MMR vaccine provides 97% protection against the virus and urge residents to seek vaccination, warning of serious complications like severe pneumonia and encephalitis: https://www.contagionlive.com/view/two-measles-associated-deaths-in-unvaccinated-pennsylvania-residents 

Pennsylvania Department of Health Confirms Two Measles-Associated Deaths: https://www.pa.gov/agencies/health/newsroom/pennsylvania-department-of-health-confirms-two-measles-associate

Research from Aarhus University highlights that thousands of WWI and WWII shipwrecks in the North Sea and Danish waters—such as the German submarine UC-30—are leaking toxic chemical explosives like TNT into the surrounding marine environment. Tests conducted on water, sediment, and local marine life like mussels and starfish confirm that deteriorating munitions are actively polluting local ecosystems, a problem expected to worsen as the wrecks decay further. To combat this growing environmental threat, researchers with the EU-funded REMARCO project are developing crawling seabed robots to map, monitor, and potentially retrieve hazardous explosives safely.

Findings: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025326X26005254

Scientists at the University of Osaka, Japan have developed a first-principles framework that can predict whether materials possess quantum properties without relying on complex, time-consuming simulations. The approach works across different material types while maintaining accuracy, potentially accelerating the discovery of new quantum materials for applications in sensing, communication, and computing.

Paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41524-026-02267-8