It was close to midnight Beijing time. In Taipan village, a small mountain village in Guizhou Province in Southwest China, a basketball game was underway. Tens of thousands of spectators filled the court, and every time when points were scored, the sidelines rang with cheers and the banging of pots and pans. Incredibly, millions of netizens watched the game on their cell phones.
Starting last summer, a phenomenal basketball tournament was born in this small village of 1,200 people, generating national attention. People call this village basketball tournament "Village BA," and some compare it to the famed Rucker Park, a basketball mecca in New York City.
The 28-year-old Ou Minghui is a Guizhou native. He led his team to win the championship in the previous Village BA tournament and he won the tournament MVP. Ou started playing basketball at the age of 8 and his idol is Kobe Bryant. Although Ou's current job is raising cattle, playing basketball has always been his dream.
In China, amateur basketball players like Ou are called "grassroots players." Most of the participants in the Village BA tournament come from Taipan and its surrounding villages, including farmers, cooks, drivers. Even people who work in nearby provinces, such as Guangdong, take time off to play in the tournament.
"The professional players have their dreams and we have ours," Ou said.
Basketball has a long tradition in Taipan, where the first basketball court, though substandard, was built in 1936. Since then, during summer festivals when the Miao people - one of the 56 ethnic groups in China, and many of the villagers in Taipan are Miao who still retain their own culture and customs - celebrate the harvest, Taipan village has organized basketball tournaments, inviting villagers from the neighboring areas to participate.
For decades, the prizes for contest winners were never paid in cash. In the past, villagers took out their own rice and gave it to the winners of the tournament. Nowadays, the top teams receive prizes such as cows, sheep and piglets, all of which are local specialties.
Whether on or off the court, the Village BA basketball tournament brings people a completely different feeling from professional events. Many spectators stand on hillsides and rooftops, or climb up ladders or treetops just to find the best viewing angle. Once these on-site spectators used their smartphones and social media networks to share their joy, viewers from all over the country were soon attracted to Village BA as well.
Lin Yongping, 55, and her family drove three hours from another city in Guizhou Province to the village of Taipan. It was her first time to see a basketball game live.
"It doesn't matter to me how the match result goes," Lin said. "I don't really know the basketball rules but we cheer for whoever scores."
Basketball is very popular in China and people are well aware of the NBA games. In July, Minnesota Timberwolves player Li Kai'er, formerly known as Kyle Anderson before his naturalization, became a player for the Chinese national team and participated in the FIBA Basketball World Cup.
China's basketball legend Yao Ming, who once played for NBA franchise the Houston Rockets, is currently the President of the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA). Speaking about the Village BA, Yao said he was afraid he wouldn't be able to snag a ticket, even though it's free.
There were quite a few NBA elements at the Village BA games. Many spectators wore jerseys of Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Tracy McGrady, Jeremy Lin and other stars when watching the games.
Not long ago, the NBA and Village BA established some connections.
As part of his China Tour, Miami Heat player Jimmy Butler came to the village of Taipan. Wearing Miao silver jewelry and carrying Miao embroidery, Butler was applauded and cheered by thousands of fans. When asked about how he felt, Butler repeated the word "incredible" several times in his answer. When he left the village, he asked the staff for pictures and video footages and shared this unforgettable experience on his personal social media account.
Wu Xiaolong, 31, a villager from Taipan village, was particularly excited by Butler's arrival. "I watch NBA games every year," Wu said. "Now foreign friends also see the games in our hometown, I feel very happy and proud."
US basketball star Stephon Marbury, who has worked for many years in China's top basketball league CBA, also came to the Village BA to train with local young players. Brooklyn Nets player Ben Simmons, on the other hand, donated a basketball court to a town in Guizhou. "I have visited China many times since I was a teenager, and I am deeply touched by the warmth and friendliness of the Chinese people and their love for basketball." Simmons said he hopes to bring the joy of basketball to more people by donating the court.
An American netizen on Twitter commented that whether it's the NBA or the Village BA, the people of China, like the people of the US and the rest of the world, have the right to enjoy sports and to unite in the pursuit of a better life.
For Village BA spectators and local people, Village BA is more than just a basketball game, it feels like a carnival.
At halftime, there are various cultural performances - people dressed in ethnic minority costumes, audience members singing Cantonese songs from the 1990s, and children break-dancing to the tune of song "I will survive."
Outside the stadium, local villagers have set up stalls selling specialty snacks such as cold noodles, fried yam and ice jelly, most of which sell for less than $1 each. There are also villagers who offer ethnic minority clothing for rent for out-of-town visitors to use for photo shoots and social media posts.
Cen Jianglong, a villager from Taipan village, quit his job outside Guizhou last year and returned home, where he and his wife opened a restaurant near the stadium. The restaurant does very good business during the games in July and August. "The villagers hope that the Village BA will drive everyone to get rich together," Cen said.
Village BA offers opportunities and hope for Chinese villages like Taipan. During the 2022 games, the village welcomed over 400,000 tourists, generating combined tourism revenue of about $3 million.
In Rongjiang county, a few hours away from Taipan village by car, a local soccer tournament has had the same impact as the Village BA. At the recent China International Fair for Trade in Services in Beijing, the English Premier League signed a cooperation agreement with the village soccer tournament, with both sides planning training sessions and content interaction, and considering organizing friendly soccer matches.
This year, the Village BA is being held as a national tournament in villages across the country as part of China's plan to revitalize the countryside. In October, the Village BA finals will return to its birthplace in Taipan, where the game is often played from dawn to dusk. In this area, basketball games are often played from darkness to dawn, known locally as "dawn culture."
"Kobe once said, 'Have you ever seen the scene of Los Angeles at 4 am?'" A fan wrote on social media. "I'd say that you can see Taipan at 4 am through the Village BA."
Namibia on Tuesday launched an initiative aimed at rewarding, recognizing and supporting individuals and entities that play a pivotal role in ensuring the safety, hospitality, kindness, care and preservation of the country's tourism.
The campaign, dubbed "Tourism Heroes," was launched by the Gondwana Collection, a hub for travel and safaris in Namibia, in response to a concerning surge in criminal activities targeting international tourists.
Speaking at the launch, Namibian Minister of Environment, Forestry and Tourism Pohamba Shifeta said this reward system will assist and support the government efforts in ensuring that culprits and criminals that target tourists and tourist establishments are quickly identified, apprehended, and brought to book to face the full wrath of the law.
Gondwana Collection Namibia showed its commitment to this cause by contributing 1 million Namibian dollars (about 67,000 US dollars) through the Gondwana Care Trust.
"This great initiative is forward-looking, and we hope that it will be used to bring crime incidents against tourists to zero in Namibia," Shifeta said, welcoming the establishment of the Tourism Protection Unit by the Namibian Police.
Meanwhile, Peter Katjavivi, speaker of the National Assembly who also attended the launch, highlighted the importance of the hospitality industry as well as tourists visiting the country, noting that there is a need to make the southern African country welcoming to all tourists and make it the preferred destination for tourists to experience true hospitality in Africa.
Last week, Namibia experienced a spate of violent attacks on international tourists, which Shifeta condemned as a serious concern for the industry which contributes significantly to the country's gross domestic product.
In the Chinese science-fiction novel "The Three-Body Problem," Wallfacer Bill Hines and his wife develop the Mental Seal as part of his Wallfacer Project plan. The Mental Seal can directly imprint thoughts and beliefs on people's brains based on the theory of "brain quantum layer activity."
The fictional plot is increasingly becoming a real-life possibility as the research and application of brain-computer interfaces (BCI) technology improves rapidly around the world, which not only leads to renewed hope for the treatment of many diseases, but also offers the first possibility of increased longevity of a healthy person's consciousness, and even immorality.
The rapid development of BCI technology and concerns over how it might change relationships and interactions between humans and machines has also prompted increased vigilance and caution among global authorities regarding opening the free market door to the technology as there has not yet been an approved invasive BCI product on the market globally.
Aside from practical concerns over the various complex fields involved, potential damage to the human brain, the risk of personal information leakage, as well as ethical controversies, questions haunting the development of BCIs also expand further to metaphysical considerations like: What do BCIs mean for humanity? Would BCIs take control of human beings' brains? Would immortality become possible with BCIs and would we be still human if our bodies are merged with computers?
Rapid advancement
The BCI system refers to the creation of a new information exchange pathway between the brain and external devices. On one hand, it converts brain signals into machine-readable signals to achieve effective mechanical control. On the other hand, it converts external device signals into brain-readable signals to directly interface with the brain. From a technical perspective, the implementation of a BCI device can be invasive or non-invasive.
Wuhan-based Nuracom, in an interview with the Global Times, stated that the company's micro-needle has high reliability and stability in both mechanical and electrical characteristics, making it suitable for neural signal recording and neuron stimulation.
On August 25, Nuracom's ultra-high-density implantable BCI system was recognized by a panel of 11 top experts in China in science and technology, including Chinese Academy of Sciences academician Zhao Jizong and Member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering Li Peigen. The expert group believes that the system is innovative, technologically advanced, has broad application prospects, is comparatively advanced in the on an international scale, and will promote the technological progress of China's brain-computer interfaces industry.
Nearly a month later, Neuralink, a BCI technology company founded by Elon Musk, announced that it had obtained approval from the reviewing independent institutional review board and their first hospital site was ready to begin recruitment for the first-in-human clinical trial for the company's fully-implantable, wireless BCI device.
Nuracom also said the company is conducting extensive preclinical research, including verification of product performance, safety and reliability tests, as well as extensive animal trials.
"We are collaborating with medical institutions to conduct in-depth research on relevant diseases, improve our products through these studies, and ultimately develop a comprehensive diagnosis and treatment plan to benefit patients. We have also conducted extensive preclinical research and actively laid out clinical trials and registration of medical devices, which will lead to the introduction of clinical diagnostic and treatment products to the market," the company said in a statement to the Global Times.
Neuralink's product implants electrodes one by one through a robotic insertion method and assembles them by soldering to an external device. The product also needs to transmit neural signals out to an external circuit board for A/D conversion before sending out digital signals.
By contrast, Nuracom's innovative on-site neural signal processing technology optimizes signal quality, improves signal decoding accuracy, and has stimulation precision. It can achieve a one-time implantation of 65,536-channel microneedles, solving the problems of the current single electrode implantation method, which is time-consuming and inefficient.
Nuracom said its BCI system not only has precise brainwave signal acquisition capabilities, but also enables reverse stimulation, providing researchers with more complex paradigms.
As leading companies enter the clinical stage, the BCI market is entering a critical period for market adoption. According to a report released by dongfangqb.com, a Chinese industry expert consulting service platform, the global BCI market was valued at $1.74 billion in 2022 and is expected to reach $3.3 billion by 2027.
The Chinese market for BCI devices is expected to have a significant amplification effect when combined with specific use cases. It is estimated that by 2040, the market size of BCI devices in China will reach 56 billion yuan ($7.66 billion), with a compound annual growth rate of 21 percent.
Among them, the research-grade device market is estimated to be 1.5 billion yuan, and the consumer-grade device market is estimated to be 54.5 billion yuan. The report predicts that the market for BCI devices in China could be valued at hundreds of billions in the future.
Broad potentials
The development of BCI technology has a history of nearly a century since the invention of the electroencephalogram (EEG) in 1924. Before Neuralink's technology debuted in the arena of public discourse in August 2020, multiple international teams had already conducted research on the application of BCIs, most of it in clinical medicine.
In 1978, American biomedical scientist William Dobelle implanted an array of 68 electrodes into the visual cortex of a blind patient, allowing the patient to perceive grayscale modulated dot matrix images within a limited field of view by connecting a camera.
In the 21st century, with the overall scientific and technological advancement, BCI technology has seen rapid growth. In 1998, American scientists implanted a BCI device into the brain of a patient who suffered a brainstem stroke, enabling the patient to control a computer cursor. In 2014, Juliano Pinto, a 28-year-old quadriplegic man, controlled an exoskeleton through a brain-computer interface and kicked the first ball of the World Cup opening ceremony in Brazil, marking a milestone in the development of brain-computer interface technology.
On August 23 this year, a new study was published in Nature demonstrating that BCIs can help restore speech for people who have lost the ability due to paralysis. The clinical trial participant - who can no longer use the muscles of her lips, tongue, larynx, and jaws to enunciate units of sound clearly - was able to generate 62 words per minute on a computer screen simply by attempting to speak. This is more than three times as fast as the previous record for assisted communication using implanted BCI devices and an approach toward the roughly 160-word-per-minute rate of natural conversation among English speakers.
BCIs technology is also used in research for the treatment of various psychological and neurological disorders. In 1997, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the first deep brain stimulation (DBS) device for the treatment of essential tremor. In 2002, the device was approved for the treatment of Parkinson's disease, the treatment of dystonia in 2003, and the treatment of epilepsy in 2018.
A switch between heaven and hell
The DBS technology is also the research foundation for the clinical research project on the use of BCI technology for treatment-resistant depression at the Ruijin Hospital, affiliated with the Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine.
The principle of DBS involves implanting electrodes into specific neural circuits in the brain to regulate corresponding neural clusters through electrical stimulation for therapeutic purposes. However, in previous experiments in the use of DBS for the treatment of depression, once the surgery was completed and the electrodes were implanted in the patient's brain, the parameters of electrical stimulation could only be adjusted externally, and the signals of brain activity could not be transmitted outwards.
In other words, the communication between the brain and the machine was one-way, explained Sun Bomin, director of the Functional Neurosurgery Center at Ruijin Hospital and initiator of the clinical study of the use of BCI treatment for treatment-resistant depression, to the Global Times.
Research conducted at the Ruijin Hospital integrates BCI devices into DBS technology, which not only allows for external parameter adjustment but also enables continuous collection and export of deep brain activity data from patients, achieving true bidirectional information exchange. These data will help doctors to study the pathogenesis of depression and improve the effectiveness of precise stimulation for patients, Sun said.
According to Sun, he and his team have made unprecedented discoveries in this clinical trial: The energy of a slow-wave frequency band in the gamma wave range in the brain is positively correlated with the symptoms of depressed patients, known as "biomarkers." This means that the patient's "good state" and "bad state" can be quantified into different waveforms. In future research, based on the performance of these "biomarkers," researchers can provide corresponding stimulation to patients to maintain a "good state", thereby achieving the desired therapeutic effect.
Data shows that using BCI technology to regulate the brain can lead to an average improvement of over 60 percent in postoperative depression symptoms, according to a report the hospital released in April.
For Wu Xiaotian, one of the volunteers in Sun's team's project, the device researchers put in his right chest is like a switch that can transport him from a "hell of depression" to a "heaven of happiness."
The device is connected to two electrodes, extending from the device to behind the ears, and then from the back of the brain to the front of the brain, passing through the nerve nuclei at the front of the brain. When the device sends electric currents and stimulates the nerves, the symptoms of depression are eased or made to disappear.
Every morning when I turn on the device, I feel like I am freed from the prison of depression, Wu said.
Some people have expressed concern that BCIs might become something akin to "spiritual opium" for these patients as they rely on the device for emotional regulation and quotidian function.
Sun dispelled such worry, explaining that "we implant BCIs in these patients to control their brains in order to cure their diseases. These recipients are patients who need such treatment. We would not implant these devices in healthy people, so there is no reason to worry."
Beyond controversies
Although Sun is seemingly clear on the aim of his research, concerns over how BCI technology might change relationships and interactions between humans and machines has prompted increased vigilance among global authorities.
It may still be too early for human beings to be able to answer questions above as it very likely would take years, even decades, before a mature implantable BCI product is available on the market, and an understanding of and discussions around the issue are also improving accordingly.
But human beings still have to seize the current opportunity to get current decisions right, experts have warned. Only as people deal with these concerns step by step, will we be able to approach a controllable future.
The impact caused by [technology] depends on its application scenarios. Therefore, it is necessary to determine the priority application areas of brain-machine interface technology that can have a beneficial impact on humans and focus on in-depth research and application, said scientists from Nuracom when asked about how to address ethical controversies surrounding brain-machine interface technology.
We believe that within the framework of law and ethics, brain-machine interfaces technology, in its application process, can reduce negative impacts and ultimately benefit humanity and society, the scientists stressed.
Some experts have urged that it is necessary to establish a sound ethical framework and moral guidelines for the behavior of brain-machine interfaces developers and users in practice, ensuring the legality and morality of the technology.
Some countries have been making such moves. In 2021, Chile became the first country to have enumerated specific brain-related rights in its constitution, establishing the rights to personal identity, free will, and mental privacy.
The 2021 yearly global cybersecurity report released by the Chinese public security authority also highlighted legal regulation of some rapidly advancing technologies such as quantum computing and BCIs.
The Maldivian presidential election concluded recently with Mohamed Muizzu winning 54 percent of the vote, making him the newly elected president of the Maldives. His campaign slogan, "India Out," has sparked extensive speculation in Indian media that he is pro-China, which could potentially harm India's strategic interests in South Asia and the Indian Ocean. India places great importance on its relationship with the Maldives. The Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) described India's position in the Maldives as "pre-eminent," with relations extending to virtually all areas. However, the excessive focus on the newly elected Maldivian president reflects India's strategic self-doubt, as it has long emphasized the so-called Chinese threat in strategic terms.
When considering bilateral issues, India should do more self-reflection rather than fabricating a "Chinese threat" out of thin air. The "India Out" movement in the Maldives began as early as 2020, reflecting widespread dissatisfaction among Maldivians with India.
Maldivians believe that India's longstanding military presence in their country is a threat to their sovereignty. India maintains a military presence in the Maldives to operate the Dornier aircraft and two helicopters gifted to Male in 2020 and 2013, respectively. In November 2021, the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) had informed the parliamentary committee on security services that 75 Indian military personnel were stationed in the Maldives to operate the aircraft and choppers.
In addition to its military presence, India has assisted in building a new police academy in the Maldives, which houses the Maldives National College of Policing and Law Enforcement. Some believe this could interfere with the Maldives' independent law-enforcement authority.
The Maldives is also concerned about India's involvement in the development of Uthuru Thila Falhu, an island near the capital, Male, which is part of the two countries' defense cooperation. In 2021, the countries signed an agreement to develop and maintain a coast guard harbor and dockyard at Uthuru Thila Falhu. The island is a point to watch the incoming and outgoing traffic at the main port in Male, which has a highly strategic position.
While security cooperation between the Maldives and India has a long history, from the Maldives' perspective, such cooperation should be based on mutual equality, rather than actions that may infringe on national sovereignty. The strong call for "India Out" in the Maldives does not necessarily equate to "China In" as there has been no "China In" movement thus far. India views the Maldives as a strategic outpost in the Indian Ocean, but it is not necessary to always perceive China as an imaginary enemy. Such behavior only highlights a lack of strategic confidence.
China has long pursued cooperation with neighboring countries based on the principle of mutual benefit. China does not interfere in the domestic affairs and strategic autonomy of other countries. China's cooperation with the Maldives primarily focuses on improving livelihoods and social development, such as upgrading and constructing major international airports in the Maldives and building the China-Maldives Friendship Bridge.
India has maintained a "big brother" mentality in dealing with South Asian affairs, considering the region as its backyard. Whether India can treat South Asian countries, including Bangladesh, Nepal, the Maldives and Sri Lanka, as equals has been a question mark for a long time. On the surface, India follows a "neighborhood first" policy and plays a leading role in South Asian affairs. However, in reality, India leverages its geopolitical advantage and size in the region to compel South Asian countries to make choices that favor India on critical issues.
India is eagerly awaiting the "Indian Century." New Delhi has hosted numerous diplomatic events around the G20 summit this year, striving to present itself as a major global power with significant achievements.
Meanwhile, India has been assertive in handling its diplomatic relationships, such as cracking down on Chinese companies in India and imposing obstacles for Chinese citizens to obtain visas. However, the excessive attention on the Maldivian election result reflects India's self-doubt from another perspective. India needs to adjust its mind-set. Strategic self-doubt and excessive suspicion of China do not benefit India's aspirations for a major global role.
On Tuesday, Bakyt Torobaev, deputy chairman of the Cabinet of Ministers of Kyrgyzstan, held a meeting with representatives of many Chinese businesses to boost trade and investment cooperation with China. Following the meeting, the Global Times reporter Wang Cong interviewed Torobaev. The following is an excerpt from the interview.
GT: What are the main goals of your trip to China? And what have been achieved so far?
Torobaev: At the invitation of the vice premier of China's State Council, we participated in the 2023 Global Sustainable Transport Forum. In my speech there, I said that we should further advance cooperation in the transport sector. Transportation is the same as the human blood circulation system. By developing transportation, we can increase trade cooperation. The directions of cooperation with Kyrgyzstan include the construction of railways, the construction of renewable energy power plants, the development of irrigation water technology, the development of education, etc. We hope to have closer cooperation with China in all fields.
GT: What are the top areas that have great potential for China-Kyrgyzstan cooperation?
Torobaev: Priority industries that need development are agriculture, high-tech fields, hydropower, and mineral resource development. We provide all conveniences for Chinese enterprises, and we hope that Chinese goods can be sold to other countries through Kyrgyzstan. Kyrgyzstan is a member of the Eurasian Economic Union and has obtained the Generalized Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) with 6,200 products that can be exported to Europe. We hope to become a dry port for Chinese products exported to other countries.
Accompanied by a piercing whistle, the ship Ganghang Runyang 6002 was loaded with 96 TEUs, 2,000 tons of wheat and rice, and set off from Chunjiang Port of Jiangbei Modern Grain Logistics Park in Jining City, Shandong Province. Seven days later, this high-quality grains will arrive at Taicang Port along the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, and then be transported to Xintian Port in Wanzhou, Chongqing via the Yangtze River waterway, while the vessel will return to Jining with southern fertilizers and other goods. This marks the official opening of the first container route of "Jining-Wanzhou," and it is also another big step for Jining Port to develop westward. Jining, as the "Canal Capital" and the "Ridge of the Canal", based on the unique advantages of the golden waterway of the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal, and the staged completion of advanced infrastructure . On the east side of Longgong Port is a customs supervision site still under construction, which is expected to be completed in December this year. After it is officially put into use, Jining will become "an estuary in the doorway."
Longgong Port is strategically located at the intersection of Longgong River and Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, with a linear distance of only 7 kilometers from Jining West Railway Station. It can realize the combined transportation of public iron and water. The construction and commissioning of Longgong Port is a major initiative in promoting energy transformation in Shandong. The service team of power supply company is at the port construction site. Jining Longgong Port is the first container port in the inland river in China to realize unmanned intelligent duty. By the end of 2023, a total of 10 berths will be built, turning the port into the largest inland river shipping center in the northern China. Jining Power Supply Company of State Grid has set up a service team to guide the construction of special railway lines and ensure that one project and one team can provide full life-cycle services. In order to ensure the normal use of electricity in port construction, the company intervened in advance, followed up the service, completed the construction task of Longgong power supply project, and upgraded the lines involved in the port, transforming 4.9 kilometers of 10 kV lines and 21.4 kilometers of 110 kV lines
China on Tuesday released implementation guidelines as part of standards for new emerging industries, vowing to continuously improve the technical level and internationalization of new industry standards, and to provide solid technical support for accelerating the high-quality development of new industries by 2035.
The guidelines, released by four ministries including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, have been divided into three steps.
The guidelines said that by 2025, the standard system that supports the development of emerging industries will be gradually improved, and the standards that will lead the innovation and development of future industries will be accelerated.
By 2030, the standard system that meets the high-quality development needs of new industries will continue to improve, and the standardization work system will become more complete.
By 2035, the supply of standards to meet the high-quality development needs of new industries will be more sufficient, and new industry standardization work will be fully formed.
The emerging industries include eight major fields: new generation information technology, new energy, new materials, high-end equipment, new energy vehicles, green environmental protection, civil aviation, ships and ocean engineering equipment.
As for future industries, the plan said it will focus on the metaverse, brain-computer interface, quantum information, humanoid robots, generative artificial intelligence, bio-manufacturing, future displays, future networks and new energy storage.
To ensure sound implementation, the plan said it will take concrete measures including increasing resource input and promoting national science and technology projects.
Rainfall shifts caused by climate change plus the escalating water demands of a growing world population threaten society’s ability to meet its mounting needs. By 2025, the United Nations predicts, 2.4 billion people will live in regions of intense water scarcity, which may force as many as 700 million people from their homes in search of water by 2030.
Those water woes have people thirstily eyeing the more than one sextillion liters of water in Earth’s oceans and some underground aquifers with high salt content. For drinking or irrigation, the salt must come out of all those liters. And while desalination has been implemented in some areas — such as Israel and drought-stricken California — for much of the world, salt-removal is a prohibitively expensive energy drain. Scientists and engineers, however, aren’t giving up on the quest for desalination solutions. The technology underlying modern desalination has been around for decades, “but we have not driven it in such a way as to be ubiquitous,” says UCLA chemical engineer Yoram Cohen. “That’s what we need to figure out: how to make desalination better, cheaper and more accessible.”
Recent innovations could bring costs down and make the technology more accessible. A new wonder material may make desalination plants more efficient. Solar-powered disks could also serve up freshwater with no need for electricity. Once freshwater is on tap, coastal floating farms could supply food to Earth’s most parched places, one scientist proposes.
Watering holes Taking the salt out of water is hardly a new idea. In the fourth century B.C., Aristotle noted that Greek sailors would evaporate impure water, leaving the salt behind, and then condense the vapor to make drinkable water. In the 1800s, the advent of steam-powered travel and the subsequent need for water without corrosive salt for boilers prompted the first desalination patent, in England.
Most modern desalination plants use a technique that differs from these earlier efforts. Instead of evaporating water, pumps force pressurized saltwater from the ocean or salty underground aquifers through special sheets. These membranes contain molecule-sized holes that act like club bouncers, allowing water to pass through while blocking salt and other contaminants.
The membranes are rolled like rugs and stuffed into meter-long tubes with additional layers that direct water flow and provide structural support. A large desalination plant uses tens of thousands of membranes that fill a warehouse. This process is known as reverse osmosis and the result is salt-free water plus a salty brine waste product that is typically pumped underground or diluted with seawater and released back into the ocean. It takes about 2.5 liters of seawater to make 1 liter of freshwater.
In 2015, more than 18,000 desalination plants worldwide had the annual capacity to produce 31.6 trillion liters of freshwater across 150 countries. While still less than 1 percent of worldwide freshwater usage, desalination production is two-thirds higher than it was in 2008. Driving the boom is a decades-long drop in energy requirements thanks to innovations such as energy-efficient water pumps, improved membranes and plant configurations that use outbound water to help pressurize incoming water. Seawater desalination in the 1970s consumed as much as 20 kilowatt-hours of energy per cubic meter of produced fresh-water; modern plants typically require just over three kilowatt-hours.
Water, water, everywhere Desalination plants supply water to more than 300 million people worldwide and experts expect that number to grow. Blue dots in this map represent the more than 500 large desalination plants currently in operation. Each plant produces more than 20 million liters of freshwater daily from seawater and salty groundwater. The number of smaller plants, such as those that provide freshwater on ships or for personal use, is unclear.
Source: DesalData/Global Water Intelligence, the International Desalination Association
There’s a limit, however, to the energy savings. Theoretically, separating a cubic meter of freshwater from two cubic meters of seawater requires a minimum of about 1.06 kilowatt-hours of energy. Desalination is typically only viable when it’s cheaper than the next alternative water source, says Brent Haddad, a water management expert at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Alternatives, such as reducing usage or piping freshwater in from afar, can help, but these methods don’t create more H2O. While other hurdles remain for desalination, such as environmentally friendly wastewater disposal, cost is the main obstacle.
The upfront cost of each desalination membrane is minimal. For decades, most membranes have been made from polyamide, a synthetic polymer prized for its low manufacturing cost — around $1 per square foot. “That’s very, very cheap,” says MIT materials scientist Shreya Dave. “You can’t even buy decent flooring at Home Depot for a dollar a square foot.”
But polyamide comes with additional costs. It degrades quickly when exposed to chlorine, so when the source water contains chlorine, plant workers have to add two steps: remove chlorine before desalination, then add it back later, since drinking water requires chlorine as a disinfectant. To make matters worse, in the absence of chlorine, the membranes are susceptible to growing biological matter that can clog up the works.
With these problems in mind, researchers are turning to other membrane materials. One alternative, graphene oxide, may knock polyamide out of the water.
Membrane maze Since its discovery in 2004, graphene has been touted as a supermaterial, with proposed applications ranging from superconductors to preventing blood clots (SN: 10/3/15, p. 7; SN Online: 2/11/14). Each graphene sheet is a single-atom-thick layer of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb grid. As a hypothetical desalination membrane, graphene would be sturdy and put up little resistance to passing water, reducing energy demands, says MIT materials scientist Jeff Grossman. Pure graphene is astronomically expensive and difficult to make in large sheets. So Grossman, Dave and colleagues turned to a cheaper alternative, graphene oxide. The carbon atoms in graphene oxide are bordered by oxygen and hydrogen atoms.
Those extra atoms make graphene oxide “messy,” eliminating many of the material’s unique electromagnetic properties. “But for a membrane, we don’t care,” Grossman says. “We’re not trying to run an electric current through it, we’re not trying to use its optical properties — we’re just trying to make a thin piece of material we can poke holes into.”
The researchers start with graphene flakes peeled from hunks of graphite, the form of carbon found in pencil lead. Researchers suspend the graphene oxide flakes, which are easy and cheap to make, in liquid. As a vacuum sucks the liquid out of the container, the flakes form a sheet. The researchers bind the flakes together by adding chains of carbon and oxygen atoms. Those chains latch on to and connect the graphene oxide flakes, forming a maze of interconnected layers. The length of these chains is fine-tuned so that the gaps between flakes are just wide enough for water molecules, but not larger salt molecules, to pass through.
The team can fashion paperlike graphene oxide sheets a couple of centimeters across, though the technique should easily scale up to the roughly 40-square-meter size currently packed into each desalination tube, Dave says. Furthermore, the sheets hold up under pressure. “We are not the only research group using vacuum filtration to assemble membranes from graphene oxide,” she says, “but our membranes don’t fall apart when exposed to water, which is a pretty important thing for water filtration.”
The slimness of the graphene oxide membranes makes it much easier for water molecules to pass through compared with the bulkier poly-amide, reducing the energy needed to pump water through them. Grossman, Dave and colleagues estimated the cost savings of such highly permeable membranes in 2014 in a paper in Energy & Environmental Science. Desalination of ground-water would require 46 percent less energy; processing of saltier seawater would use 15 percent less, though the energy demands of the new proto-types haven’t yet been tested.
So far, the new membranes are especially durable, Grossman says. “Unlike polyamide, graphene oxide membranes are resilient to important cleaning chemicals like chlorine, and they hold up in harsh chemical environments and at high temperatures.” With lower energy requirements and no need to remove and replace chlorine from source water, the new membranes could be one solution to many desalination challenges. In large quantities, the graphene oxide membranes may be economically viable, Dave predicts. At scale, she estimates that manufacturing graphene oxide membranes will cost around $4 to $5 per square foot — not drastically more expensive than polyamide, considering its other benefits. Existing plants could swap in graphene oxide membranes when older polyamide membranes need replacing, spreading out the cost of the upgrade over about 10 years, Dave says. The team is currently patenting its membrane–making methodology, though the researchers think it will take a few more years before the technology is commercially viable.
“We are at a point where we need a quantum leap, and that can be achieved by new membrane structures,” says Nikolay Voutchkov, executive director of Water Globe Consulting, a company that advises industries and municipalities on desalination projects. The work on graphene oxide “is one way to do it.”
Other materials are also vying to be poly-amide’s successor. Researchers are testing carbon nanotubes, tiny cylindrical carbon structures, as a desalination membrane. Which material wins “will come down to cost,” Voutchkov says. Even if graphene oxide or other membranes save money in the long run, high upfront costs would make them less appealing.
Plus, those new membranes won’t solve the problems of desalination in less-developed areas. The costs of building a large plant and pumping freshwater over long distances make desalination a hard sell in rural Africa and other water-starved places. For hard-to-reach locales, scientists are thinking small.
A portable approach In remote Africa, electricity is hard to come by. Materials scientist Jia Zhu of Nanjing University in China and colleagues are hoping to bring drinkable water to unpowered, parched places by turning to an old-school desalination technique: evaporating and condensing water.
Their system runs on sunshine, something that is both free and abundant in Earth’s hotter regions. Using the sun’s rays to desalinate water is hardly new, but most existing systems are inefficient. Only about 30 to 45 percent of incoming sunlight typically goes into evaporating water, which means a big footprint is needed to create sizable amounts of freshwater. Zhu and colleagues hope to boost efficiency with a more light-absorbing material.
The material’s fabrication starts with a base sheet made of aluminum oxide speckled with 300-nanometer-wide holes. The researchers then coat this sheet with a thin layer of aluminum particles.
When light hits aluminum particles inside one of the holes, the added energy makes electrons in the aluminum start to oscillate and ripple. These electrons can transfer some of that energy to their surroundings, heating and evaporating nearby water without the need for boiling (SN Online: 4/8/16). The researchers have produced 2.5-centimeter-wide disks of the new material so far, which are light enough to float. The black disks absorb more than 96 percent of incoming sunlight and about 90 percent of the absorbed energy is used in evaporating water, the researchers reported in the June Nature Photonics.
The evaporated water condenses and collects in a transparent box containing stainless steel. In laboratory tests, the researchers successfully desalinated water from China’s Bohai Sea to levels low enough to meet drinking water standards. The researchers reckon that they can produce around five liters of fresh-water per hour for every square meter of material under intense light. In early tests, the disks held up after multiple uses without dropping in performance.
Aluminum is cheap and the material’s fabrication process can easily scale, Zhu says. While the disks can’t produce as much drinkable water as quickly as big desalination plants, the new method may serve a different need, since it’s more affordable and more portable, he says. “We are developing a personalized water solution without big infrastructure, without extra energy consumption and with a minimum carbon footprint.” The researchers hope that their new desalination technique will find use in developing countries and remote areas where conventional desalination plants aren’t feasible.
The disks are worth pursuing, says Haddad at UC Santa Cruz. “I say let’s try it out. Let’s work with some villages and see how well the tech works and get their feedback. That to me is a good next step to take.”
Desalinating water by evaporation has a downside, though, Voutchkov says. Unlike most methods for removing salt, evaporation produces pure distilled water without any important dissolved minerals such as calcium and magnesium. Drinking water without those minerals can cause health issues over time, he warns. “It’s OK for a few weeks, but you can’t drink it forever.” Minerals would need to be added back in to the water, which is hard to do in remote places, he says.
Freshwater isn’t just for filling water bottles, though. With a nearly endless supply of salt-free water at hand, desalination could bring agriculture to new places.
Coastal crops When Khaled Moustafa looks at a beach, he doesn’t just see a place for sunning and surfing. The biologist at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts in Paris sees the future of farming.
In the April issue of Trends in Biotechnology, Moustafa proposed that desalination could supply irrigation water to colossal floating farms. Self-sufficient floating farms could bring agriculture to arid coastal regions previously inhospitable to crops. The idea, while radical, isn’t too farfetched, given recent technological advancements, Moustafa says.
Floating farms would lay anchor along coastlines and suck up seawater, he proposes. A solar panel–powered water desalination system would provide freshwater to rows of cucumbers, tomatoes or strawberries stacked like a big city high-rise inside a “blue house” (that is, a floating greenhouse). Each floating farm would stretch 300 meters long by 100 meters wide, providing about 1 square kilometer of cultivable surface over only three-hundredths of a square kilometer of ocean, Moustafa says. The farms could even be mobile, cruising around the ocean to transport crops and escape bad weather.
Such a portable and self-contained farming solution would be most appealing in dry coastal regions that get plenty of sunshine, such as the Arabian Gulf, North Africa and Australia.
“I wouldn’t say it’s a silly idea,” Voutchkov says. “But it’s an idea that can’t get a practical implementation in the short term. In the long term, I do believe it’s a visionary idea.”
Floating farms may come with a large price tag, Moustafa admits. Still, expanding agriculture should “be more of a priority than building costly football stadiums or indoor ski parks in the desert,” he argues.
Whether or not farming will ever take to the seas, new desalination technologies will transform the way society quenches its thirst. More than 300 million people rely on desalination for at least some of their daily water, and that number will only grow as needs rise and new materials and techniques improve the process.
“Desalination can sometimes get a rap for being energy intensive,” Dave says. “But the immediate benefits of having access to water that would not otherwise be there are so large that desalination is a technology that we will be seeing for a long time into the future.”
This article appears in the August 20, 2016, Science News with the headline, “Quenching society’s thirst: Desalination may soon turn a corner, from rare to routine.”
Your summer suntan is almost entirely locally sourced. But a smidgen of that healthy glow hails not from the sun but from the ultraviolet light of nearby stars and other galaxies: less than one-billionth of 1 percent. Even photons lingering from the Big Bang contribute some: roughly 0.001 percent.
Simon Driver, an astronomer at the University of Western Australia in Crawley, and colleagues calculated these numbers, but not because they’re interested in tanning. They were trying to decipher the extragalactic background light, or EBL, a diffuse glow that fills the universe (SN: 9/7/13, p. 22). Using galaxy observations from multiple telescopes, they assessed the number of EBL photons, from infrared to ultraviolet, that reach Earth. About half originated with the formation of galaxy cores and supermassive black holes during roughly the first 4 billion years of cosmic history, the researchers report in the Aug. 20 Astrophysical Journal. The growth of disks of stars in galaxies since that time accounts for the other half.
Deep-sea viruses aren’t just dealers of disease; they’re crucial players in Earth’s nutrient cycles. In marine sediments, virus assassinations of single-celled life-forms called archaea play a much larger role in carbon and other chemical cycles than previously thought, new research suggests. For instance, those microbial murders release as much as 500 million metric tons of carbon annually worldwide, researchers report online October 12 in Science Advances.
Viruses are a major killer of bacteria and archaea in the deep sea, busting open infected cells like water balloons and spewing the cells’ innards. To find the relative number of massacred microbes, marine ecologist Roberto Danovaro of Polytechnic University of Marche in Ancona, Italy, and colleagues studied the spilled guts of the viruses’ victims.
Tallying the number of archaeal versus bacterial genes released from the carnage in more than 480 sediment samples, the researchers discovered that viruses kill archaea disproportionately more often than bacteria. Despite making up on average about 12 percent of the microbial population in the top 50 centimeters of sediment, archaea accounted for up to one-third of the total biomass killed by viruses, Danovaro and colleagues report. The researchers do not speculate on why archaea were such frequent targets. Those deaths were not in vain, though: Archaea corpses supply nutrients such as carbon that help sustain other life-forms.
