Indiana University – Beckman Institute Postdoctoral Researcher Yun Liu led a study that created a powerful new molecule for the extraction of salt from liquid. He did the work as a Ph.D. student at Indiana University. Built using chemical bonds previously regarded as too weak, the new molecule is about 10 billion times improved compared to a similar structure created more than a decade ago. Liu published his work in the journal Science.

Illinois News Bureau – Chemistry professor Prashant Jain and postdoctoral researcher Sungju Yu have developed an artificial photosynthesis process that converts excess CO2 into valuable fuels, bringing green technology one step closer to large-scale solar energy storage. Jain has been recognized by the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Foundation as a Beckman Young Investigator.

The Atlantic – An observed difference between bonobos – African apes that are closely related to chimpanzees – and chimps is both important and expected, says Michelle Rodrigues, an anthropologist and Beckman Institute Postdoctoral Fellow. Researchers knew that a male bonobo’s social rank depends on his mother’s, but it wasn’t clear if that was due to beneficial genes. “But if that was the case, we would see a similar pattern in chimps,” Rodrigues says. That we don’t, even though the two species are so genetically similar, “makes a compelling case” that it’s the differences in their social lives that matter.

Rodrigues commented on a story examining research showing that bonobo mothers interfere in their sons' sex lives in order to try to further their own genetic legacies.