Analysis: Science & Technology — 06 November 2026
Magnetized white dwarfs reach 2.4 solar masses in IISc simulations
Computer simulations from the Indian Institute of Science and collaborators show a carbon-oxygen white dwarf growing to about 2.4 solar masses when internal magnetic fields are included, well above the 1.4-solar-mass Chandrasekhar limit for non-magnetized, slowly rotating remnants. The team extended Cambridge’s STARS code to follow magnetized stars from the main sequence through cooling and later accretion. In one run, a 1.02-solar-mass remnant from an eight-solar-mass progenitor accreted at 10⁻⁹ solar masses per year and reached 2.4 solar masses only when magnetic pressure rose with compression. The result appears in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
White dwarfs are Earth-sized cores left after stars shed their envelopes. Electron degeneracy pressure cannot support more than about 1.4 solar masses without collapse or carbon ignition, the usual engine of Type Ia supernovae. Super-Chandrasekhar objects have been discussed for decades, and some Type Ia events are too luminous for a 1.4-solar-mass explosion. The new claim is not mere possibility but a continuous evolutionary path from a magnetized main-sequence star.
The work is simulation, not a detection of 2.4-solar-mass white dwarfs. Field generation, burial, and stability during accretion remain uncertain, and geometry could change the mass ceiling. Type Ia supernovae serve as distance candles; a wider progenitor-mass range would add scatter that magnetic models might have to correct.
Uncoated PAN membranes fractionate crude oil at room temperature
KAIST and Georgia Tech report in Nature that a bare porous polyacrylonitrile membrane separates real crude at ambient temperature after heavier hydrocarbons constrict its pores into sub-2-nanometer channels. Lighter cuts such as naphtha, gasoline, and kerosene then permeate preferentially. Flux was about 23 times that of previous leading crude-oil membranes, with 28 days of stable operation. Plant models of a modular pre-filter ahead of existing columns project 31.6% lower energy use and 36% lower operating cost.
Refineries have distilled crude above 350 °C for more than a century; global distillation uses about 1,100 TWh per year. Coated molecular-sieving films have been hard to scale. PAN is already a cheap industrial support. Fouling, usually treated as failure, here self-tunes pore size. Tests used crude from HD Hyundai Oilbank, not synthetic blends.
Large-area modules and multi-year reliability are unproven. Energy and cost figures are process-model outputs, not measured plant savings. Channel uniformity across variable crudes, and whether heavy residues eventually kill flux, will decide uptake.
Phenanthroline restructures MOF glasses during melting
A TU Dortmund-led team with Paderborn, Duisburg-Essen, and Oxford shows in Nature Materials that 1,10-phenanthroline in metal-organic framework melts acts as both flux and ligand. It lowers melting temperature, binds metal centers, raises coordination number, and rewrites the glass network. Dose sets how far the structure changes. Cobalt glasses melted this way avoid decomposition products that would spoil magnetic measurements.
MOF glasses form when framework crystals melt and quench into a disordered solid. Melt chemistry was previously fixed by the precursor, and some compositions decompose before they melt. X-ray absorption spectroscopy found cobalt’s oxidation state unchanged while local bonding was rewritten. The method also worked on carboxylate frameworks.
How far the trick extends beyond tested metals, and whether optical or magnetic functions survive in bulk pieces, is open. The melt becomes a reaction vessel, but process windows, residual organics, and long-term network stability are still unmapped.
Sources: ScienceDaily (IISc/The Astrophysical Journal Letters; KAIST/Nature; Universität Paderborn/Nature Materials).