Scientists from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) in Bhopal have discovered a more accurate method for mapping underground systems in one of India's most vital coal regions. By studying microscopic cracks in coal seams in the Jharia basin, researchers created a new mathematical framework explaining the movement of methane and carbon dioxide in the Earth's crust.
This finding provides engineers with a more precise set of tools for extracting clean-burning fuel, as well as, importantly, for safely sequestering greenhouse gases deep underground in the fight against climate change.
The Jharia coal basin, located in the state of Jharkhand, is known for its high-quality coking coal. This region also contains methane in the coal seams (Coal-Bed Methane, CBM)—a form of natural gas trapped within the coal itself. As the world transitions to renewable energy sources, CBM acts as a critical transitional fuel because it burns cleaner than coal or oil.
Furthermore, these same coal seams can function as giant carbon sinks. When carbon dioxide is injected into undeveloped coal layers, the gas can be permanently stored, preventing its release into the atmosphere and global warming.
To implement any of these technologies, engineers need to know precisely the rate at which fluids can move through coal. Unlike a standard pipe, coal is a double-porosity system. This means that gas is stored in the solid matrix of the coal but can only move through a network of tiny natural cracks called cleats. These cleats serve as the highways of the coal seam.
For decades, scientists used a standard formula known as the cubic law to predict this flow. This law assumes that the volume of fluid passing through a crack is proportional to the cube of its width, or aperture. However, the IISER Bhopal team found that this standard rule does not entirely fit the unique, stressed environment of the Jharia basin.
To confirm their findings, researchers collected samples from various conditions across the region, including deep underground mines and extensive open-pit mines, reflecting different depths and geological pressures. Using microscopy and 1D scanning methods, they measured thousands of minute cracks. They discovered that in the Jharia area, gas flow is much more sensitive to crack width than previously thought.
Instead of the third power proposed by the cubic law, they established that the flow actually scales with the fifth power. Specifically, for different types of cleats in the region, the flow followed a power exponent ranging from 4.38 to 5.08.
Researchers believe that the dependence on the fifth power is related to the shape and growth mechanism of the cracks. In Jharia, millions of years of tectonic activity, including folding and crustal faulting, compressed and stretched the coal. This created a complex network where crack width is closely related to its length in a specific scaling relationship. By understanding this relationship, scientists were able to rewrite the flow equations so that they no longer depend on crack length.
In geology, measuring crack length is an extremely difficult task. When engineers drill into the ground to take samples, they obtain only a small cylinder of rock called a core. These cores are often too narrow to show the full length of a crack, leading to insufficient sampling and inaccurate data. By creating a model that requires measuring only the crack width, which is visible even on small samples, researchers have significantly simplified the ability of field engineers to create dynamic fluid flow models without needing inaccessible data.
This research could strengthen India's energy security by making domestic natural gas extraction more predictable and efficient. It also offers a scientific roadmap for large-scale carbon sequestration. By knowing exactly how the plume of carbon dioxide migrates through the coal seam, scientists can ensure that the gas remains where it was placed, turning old coal mines into permanent storage facilities for global carbon waste. As the global community moves towards net-zero emissions, such region-specific scientific knowledge is a vital mechanism that will drive the green economy.
At the WAIC 2026 event, Huawei Cloud CEO Zhou Yu Feng introduced the AgentArts platform and the openJiuwen framework. These developments aim to implement enterprise-level agents, ensuring stability, security, and the ability to coordinate multiple agents.
Zhou Yu Feng outlined the company's strategy in enterprise AI at WAIC 2026. He emphasized that transitioning from demonstration agent models to full production systems requires three interconnected achievements: the adoption of open protocols, the utilization of reusable industry resources, and the application of a platform approach that raises both the upper and lower thresholds of agent capabilities. The central element is AgentArts—a full lifecycle platform that includes AgentStudio for flexible development, AgentRun for reliable operation, and AgentOps for continuous functioning, with openJiuwen serving as the open-source core framework.
The primary problem Huawei Cloud addresses is the gap in stability between demonstration and production agent environments. Zhou noted that agents are gradually transforming the traditional SaaS ecosystem. However, enterprises require agents capable of 24/7 operation, self-optimization, defense against AI-inherent threats, and providing constant observability of task execution chains. AgentArts solves this by introducing multi-level controllers, self-evolution capabilities, Agent Identity, session-level isolation, dynamic tokens, and detailed permission control to minimize agent errors during complex operations.
OpenJiuwen, an open-source framework for enterprise agents, shares over 90% of its code with AgentArts. It introduces two engineering paradigms: Coordination Engineering for the collaboration of multiple agents and Symbiosis Engineering for long-term human-agent cooperation. The framework treats large language models, memory stores, and agent protocols as new computational, storage, and network resources, respectively, which are managed through a unified corporate agent operating system (AgentOS). CLI and MCP serve as standard interfaces for calling external tools and services.
Several financial institutions have already begun using these technologies. China Postal Savings Bank developed an agent execution mechanism using the Huawei Cloud and openJiuwen stack, achieving automated 24/7 operation with minute-level data collection, analysis, and multi-channel distribution. Tianyancha integrated 160 MCP capabilities and converted six risk control scenarios into reusable Skills. Furthermore, Huawei Cloud, in collaboration with ICBC, China UnionPay, and over ten other financial institutions, launched the 'AI Dream Industrial Factory' initiative in the Smart Finance Zone to create and exchange industry-specific agent assets covering mobile banking, intelligent marketing, risk control, and remote banking scenarios.
The China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT) forecasts that agent penetration will reach 70% by 2027 and 90% by 2030. Nevertheless, CAICT Director Wei Kai pointed out that individual efficiency does not equal organizational efficiency. Enterprises cannot deploy agents in isolation; they require engineering methodologies for goal setting, roadmaps, evaluation systems, and continuous iteration. Simultaneously, issues such as business integration, data governance, multi-agent interaction, end-to-end security, and responsibility distribution between humans and machines must be addressed. Huawei Cloud's platform approach aims to provide the infrastructural layer necessary to achieve this systematic transformation of agents within enterprises, moving them from simple Q&A responses to executing real business tasks in banking, energy, manufacturing, and other key industries.
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has detected a supermassive black hole in the process of feeding. According to ScienceDaily, using materials from the University of Michigan, new images obtained by the James Webb Space Telescope show long gas filaments connecting the galaxy's hot outer atmosphere with the rapidly rotating disk around the central black hole.
The galaxy under study is named NGC 4696 and represents the largest central galaxy in the Centaurus Cluster. It is located approximately 145 million light-years from Earth, allowing astronomers to study it in detail while remaining far enough away to perceive its scale.
A research group led by the University of Montreal, with participation from the University of Michigan, published its findings in an issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters on July 14. The article was titled 'JWST Reveals How Black Holes are Fed: Kiloparsec-scale Multiphase Filaments Feed Subkiloparsec Circumnuclear Disks.'
The main scientific problem is that almost every large galaxy has a supermassive black hole at its center, whose mass often exceeds the Sun by millions or billions of times, yet scientists still do not know how this giant obtains fuel.
The black hole itself does not emit light; the spectacle is created by gas and dust falling onto it, which leads to heating and the formation of an active galactic nucleus. This process can also generate jets that heat the surrounding gas, slow down star formation, and contribute to galaxy formation over billions of years.
Despite the fact that black hole jets can heat nearby gas, which should hinder its cooling and subsequent infall into the black hole, the accretion process continues. The NIRSpec instrument of the James Webb Telescope observed NGC 4696 for about eight hours, splitting infrared light to map the composition and movement of the gas. ScienceDaily reports that the observations allowed for the resolution of structures measuring about 30 light-years.
The maps showed that the S-shaped structure near the galaxy's center is a rotating gas disk around the black hole, extending nearly 800 light-years, with some material moving at speeds up to 600 kilometers per second. The main discovery is the connection of this disk to one of the galaxy's large incoming gas filaments, where material moves along the filament and enters the disk feeding the black hole.
Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Michigan, Megan Donahue, noted that the James Webb observations provide 'thousands of new facts and measurements,' which is 'a large amount of information to assimilate.' The arXiv version of the article describes this system as the missing link between large cooling flows and the feeding of black holes on smaller scales, and simulations have confirmed this picture, showing gas condensation from the hot atmosphere, angular momentum loss, and subsequent disk fueling.
Thus, the cycle looks elegant: the black hole emits jets, the jets heat the gas, some of the gas cools, forming filaments, the filaments feed the disk, and the disk feeds the black hole.
As artificial intelligence rapidly develops and transforms people's lives, new problems are emerging. Chinese President Xi Jinping shared his thoughts and observations on how to address the difficulties generated by AI development.
These remarks were made during the opening of the World AI Conference 2026 and the High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance, which took place in Shanghai.
