Background: Across countries and disciplines, studies show male researchers receive more research funding than their female peers. Because most studies have been observational, it is unclear whether imbalances stem from evaluations of female research investigators or of their proposed research. In 2014, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research created a natural experiment by dividing investigator-initiated funding applications into two new grant programmes: one with and one without an explicit review focus on the calibre of the principal investigator.
The future role of stationary electricity storage is perceived as highly uncertain. One reason is that most studies into the future cost of storage technologies focus on investment cost. An appropriate cost assessment must be based on the application-specific lifetime cost of storing electricity. We determine the levelized cost of storage (LCOS) for 9 technologies in 12 power system applications from 2015 to 2050 based on projected investment cost reductions and current performance parameters.
In this paper, five most emerging renewable energy sources are analyzed. These emerging renewables are either special or advanced forms of the mainstream energy sources (solar, wind, geothermal, biofuels, biomass, and hydro) or brand new technologies. The five emerging renewable technologies discussed in this paper include marine energy, concentrated solar photovoltaics (CSP), enhanced geothermal energy (EGE), cellulosic ethanol, and artificial photosynthesis. Marine energy is divided into wave energy, tidal energy, tidal/ocean currents, salinity gradient, and ocean thermal energy conversion.
Multidisciplinary, innovative and high values development of high performance, cost-effective and environmentally acceptable separation systems is highly desired to tackle the sustainability challenges that facing current desalination technology. Owing to their versatility and immense potentials to evolve scientific and technical innovations, nanotechnology is probably one of the most prominent strategies that has gained growing scientific and public recognition to provide solutions that can extend the limits of sustainability in membrane desalination technology.
