Aerosol

• The Board of Directors at Optomec, a leading manufacturer of Digital Manufacturing solutions that offers 3D DED Metal printer technology and Aerosol Jet™fine feature printer technology in supporting many application verticals, announce that Robert Yusin has accepted the role of CEO.
• Robert has achieved a string of successes in bringing innovative companies with solid technology to the next level of revenue growth through strategic investments and creative go-to-market strategies that have transformed their outcomes.
• “We are delighted that Robert Yusin has accepted the position,” said Mike Barry, interim CEO and Board Member.
• “The timing is perfect for a person like Robert to take Optomec’s proven technology and solutions successes to the next level for our customers.”

• The energy transition does not just change the energy generation technologies we use, but also requires the power grids to be updated.
• Artificial intelligence (AI) helps process this highly complex information and integrate it into the energy system.
• This prevents heat pumps from using grid-supplied electricity to heat thermal energy storage when sufficient solar energy is expected within the next hour.
• Visitors can learn more about the possibilities of forecasting and monitoring systems at the EM-Power Forum session “Forecasting & monitoring: Always a step ahead” (“Forecasting & Monitoring: Immer einen Schritt voraus sein”) .

• CHADDS FORD, Pa., May 18, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- MOBILion Systems Inc. and Thun, Switzerland-based TOFWERK AG have announced a sublicensing agreement for the development of an ion mobility/time-of-flight (TOF) mass spectrometry product based on Structures for Lossless Ion Manipulation (SLIM) separation technology.
• TOFWERK provides innovative solutions for chemical analysis, developing time-of-flight mass spectrometers for applications that demand exceptional speed and sensitivity.
• "We are excited to be able to expand applications and continue to demonstrate the impact of the SLIM platform technology more broadly.
• TOFWERK's expertise in this market will accelerate the implementation of the SLIM technology to address customers' needs in volatile compound analysis."

• By some estimates, a billion native animals died up and down Australia’s east coast.
• While Sydney’s skies are blue again, Australia’s Black Summer has kept scientists around the globe busy.
• Now, new research by American scientists suggests the Black Summer fires were massive enough to influence the El Niño Southern Oscillation cycle.
• They could have been made more likely by the Black Summer fires.

Where there’s fire, there’s smoke

• We also know volcanoes can influence the tropical Pacific, and thus affect whether an El Niño or a La Niña phase develops.
• Volcanic ash gets blown high into the stratosphere, the part of the atmosphere just above the clouds where long-haul airplanes fly.
• Then, sunlight gets reflected before it reaches the ground, thus cooling the surface much like an umbrella can.

Is bushfire smoke the same as volcanic ash?

• It’s tempting to equate smoke with ash, and assume a large enough bushfire would have similar effects to a volcano.
• That might sound unimportant, but the rotten egg smell – which comes from sulfur – indicates major differences in the composition of volcanic ash and bushfire smoke.
• Bushfire smoke is hot, though, and hot smoke rises well.
• They found bushfire smoke does indeed shade the surface from sunlight in these simulations.

Clouds matter

• Under specific conditions, some smoke particles can interact with droplets in clouds and make clouds thicker and brighter.
• The researchers were able to show the brightness of the clouds over this area increased considerably just around the time when the smoke particles arrived.
• These brighter, whiter clouds reflected more sunlight back into space and shaded the surface underneath.
• Follow the chain: huge volumes of smoke blow east where they whiten clouds, cool the seawater, and cause less water to evaporate.

Is the link now proven? Not quite

• For one, the ENSO cycle in the simulation was heading for a double La Niña even without the impact of the smoke.
• To prove or disprove the link, we’ll have to simulate the impact of ballooning Black Summer smoke plumes across many different models.
• Read more:
  Smoke from the Black Summer fires created an algal bloom bigger than Australia in the Southern Ocean