Scientists have observed, in metals for the first time, transient excitons – the primary response of free electrons to light. Detecting excitons in metals could provide clues on how light is turned into energy in solar cells and plants.
Challenging previously held views, scientific results show that californium can covalently bond with borate, dramatically altering the electronic characteristics of the californium ion. This research may show how to further optimize nuclear reactor fuel processes.
A new material with light absorption characteristics ideally suited for making chemical fuels from sunlight was created via a nanowire growth strategy that fused the semiconductors silicon and gallium arsenide together in a new way.
The position of the University of Tennessee’s College of Engineering and Oak Ridge National Laboratory as leaders in the manufacturing revolution has taken another bold step forward with the hiring of Uday Vaidya as the Governor’s Chair in Advanced Composites Manufacturing
Scientists at Ames Lab created perovskite nanocrystals that are stable light emitters and stellar light-to-energy converters.
A promising catalyst seemed erratic in reducing the toxins released by burning gasoline and other such fuels. The catalyst’s three different surfaces behaved differently. For the first time, researchers got an atomically resolved view of the three structures. This information may provide insights into why the surfaces have distinct properties.
The Fermi Award honors the memory of Nobel Laureate Enrico Fermi, the first scientist to achieve a nuclear chain reaction and a pioneer in the field of nuclear and particle physics. The award has been presented to outstanding scientists since 1956. It is given for distinguished achievement, leadership, and service related to all basic and applied research, science, and technology supported by the U.S. Department of Energy and its programs.
For the first time, researchers have shown that momentum-hogging protons can exist in nuclei heavier than carbon.
The thinnest possible linear thread that still retains a diamond-like structure was created by the extreme compression and decompression of the common chemical benzene. The threads may have outstanding mechanical and electronic properties. Further, the synthesis method opens up possible variations that could lead to new materials.
A new patent blazes a path forward for a way to simultaneously determine the physical structure and chemical makeup of materials close to the atomic level using a combination of microscopy techniques.
Five graduate students who have won DOE Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) awards to supplement part of their Ph.D. thesis will conduct their research at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in 2015.
Professor Jizhong Zhou will receive the U.S Department of Energy’s highest scientific award from U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz in a ceremony in Washington, D.C., later this year.
Emplacement of carbon dioxide at the Bravo Dome gas field in New Mexico began more than 900,000 years earlier than previously estimated, according to scientists at DOE’s Center for Frontiers of Subsurface Energy Security. The study documents the first field evidence for the safe long-term storage of large amounts of carbon dioxide in saline aquifers.
Energy Secretary Moniz announced nine exceptional U.S. scientists and engineers as recipients of the Ernest Orlando Lawrence Award for their contributions in research and development that supports the Energy Department’s science, energy and national security missions.
Extremely small batteries built inside nanopores show that properly scaled structures can use the full theoretical capacity of the charge storage material. The batteries are part of assessing the basics of ion and electron transport in nanostructures for energy storage.
First identified more than 50 years ago, the sub-atomic particle called Lambda(1405) was routinely seen in experiments, yet two of its key characteristics were too difficult to measure. For the first time, scientists measured these descriptors: intrinsic angular momentum and parity.
Scientists devised a way of directly detecting and visualizing biomolecules and their changing association states in solution by measuring their size and charge characteristics while confined in a single-molecule trap.
Researchers created thin, flexible electronic devices that efficiently harvest the mechanical energy from natural motions of the human body. In addition to advances in materials processing to enable creating these devices, accurate analytical models were developed to predict the electrical output.
Atoms and the electrons that hold them together store energy in their electronic bonding structure and in their atomic vibrations. X-ray laser scattering techniques have been used to measure and track the transfer of energy from one atomic-scale storage mode to another.
A new process has been developed for spontaneously incorporating and assembling carbon nanotubes and oxygen-scavenging nanoparticles into chloroplasts, the part of plant cells that conduct photosynthesis. Incorporation enhanced electron flow associated with photosynthesis.
A new metal oxide was discovered whose atomic structure includes highly ordered arrays of missing oxygen atoms. This structure allows oxygen ions to move through the material quickly and easily at low temperatures.
A new porous material exhibits high electrical conductivity as a bulk material that is potentially tunable and has unusual temperature dependence, suggesting new fundamental physics.
Enabled by high-performance computing, the magnetic couplings in model systems for copper-containing cuprate superconductors were accurately calculated for the first time.
Inside algae that turn biomass to fuels, proteins change their shape to perform a specific job. These shape-changing processes are difficult to measure, but scientists have determined three classes of atomic motion.
Department of Energy and National Science Foundation sign agreement for U.S. participation in particle physics research.
A new agreement paves the way for joint projects between the United States and CERN.
Program provides support to exceptional researchers.
Scientists built the most complete functional mapping of an entire family of cellulose-degrading enzymes, glycoside hydrolase family, to date.
For the first time, nanomagnet islands or arrays were arranged into an exotic structure (called “shakti”) that does not directly relate to any known natural material. The “shakti” artificial spin ice configuration was fabricated and reproduced experimentally. The arrays are theoretical predictions of multiple ground states that are characteristic of frustrated magnetic materials. The results open the door to experiments on other artificial spin-ice lattices, predicted to host interesting phenomena.
The emergence of a new magnetic phase with a square lattice before the onset of superconductivity is revealed in some iron arsenide compounds, confirming theoretical predictions of the effects of doping on magnetic interactions between the iron atoms and their relationship to high temperature superconductivity. Understanding the origin of thermodynamic phases is vital in developing a unified theory for the elusive microscopic mechanism underlying high-temperature superconductivity.
Experiments on a copper-oxide superconductor reveal nearly static, spatially modulated magnetism. Because static magnetism and superconductivity do not like to coexist in the same material, the superconducting wave function is also likely modulated in space and phase-shifted to minimize overlap, consistent with recent theory. This insight will aid in writing a predictive theory for high-temperature superconductivity.
Using a novel microscopy technique, scientists revealed a major enhancement of coupling between electric and magnetic dipoles. The discovery could lead to devices for use in computer memory or magnetic sensors.
For the first time, germanium nanowires have been deposited on indium tin oxide substrate by a simple, one-step process called electrodeposition. The nanowires produced by this method have outstanding electronic properties and can be used as high-capacity anode material for lithium-ion batteries; however, the nanowires were previously too expensive and difficult to produce. This process may resolve the cost issue.
Metamaterials allow design and use of light-matter interactions at a fundamental level. An efficient terahertz emission from two-dimensional arrays of gold split-ring resonator metamaterials was discovered as a result of excitation by a near-infrared pulsed laser.
A stable bulk material shows the same physics found in graphene, which illuminated the interactions of electron’s orbital motion and its intrinsic magnetic orientation. The new material will be a test ground for theories on how electron interactions in solids shape exotic electron behavior.
A new semiconducting material that is only three atomic layers thick exhibits electronic properties beyond traditional semiconductors. Two nano-engineered configurations of the material have shown an enhanced response to light, possibly leading to new modes of solar energy conversion and associated devices.
For a magnetic thin film deposited onto a transition metal oxide film, the magnetic properties change dramatically as the oxide undergoes a structural phase transition. The hybrid between a simple magnetic material and a transition-metal oxide provides a “window” to understand the metal-to-insulator transition and offers dramatic tunability of magnetic properties. Potential applications are envisioned in the fields of information storage and power transmission.
Electric current flows without any resistance in a superconducting state thanks to a surprising redistribution of bonding electrons and the associated electronic and atomic behavior after substitution of some cobalt atoms for iron in barium iron arsenide.
The conference will address scientific research related to the laboratory in nearby Lead, S.D.
Climate models calculate a changing mix of clouds and emissions that interact with solar energy. To narrow the broad range of possible answers from a climate model, researchers analyzed the effect of several proven numerical stand-ins for atmospheric processes on the energy flux at the top of the atmosphere. They found that the flux is the main driver of surface temperature change.
Precipitation is difficult to represent in global climate models. Although most single-column models can reproduce the observed average precipitation reasonably well, there are significant differences in their details. Scientists evaluated several single-column models, providing insights on how to improve models’ representation of convection, which is integral to storm cloud formation.
To begin to understand poplar growth, a possible bioenergy crop, scientists at North Carolina State University built a robust high-throughput pipeline for studying the hierarchy of genetic regulation of wood formation using tissue-specific single cells called protoplasts.
Led by scientists at Pacific Northwest National Lab, a team applied sophisticated mathematical solutions to fine tune water and energy exchange parameters, numerical stand-ins for complex processes, to more accurately simulate water and energy fluxes in an important model under different conditions.
Soil carbon may not be as stable as previously thought. Also, soil microbes exert more direct control on carbon buildup than global climate models represent.
Rising carbon dioxide levels in the air act as a fertilizer for plants, altering how they use water and interact with the climate. However, an insufficient supply of nitrogen can limit the growth. Scientists adapted the Community Land Model to show how nitrogen limitation affects plant growth.
Thousands of times a second the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory re-creates the hot quark soup that existed at the dawn of the universe. Particles composed of heavy quarks can help reveal details about the quark-gluon plasma, and by extension, the early universe and the origins of matter.
Early schemes to model the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets and their impact on sea levels failed to accurately account for changes caused by snowfall and snow melt. These changes depend on ice sheet elevation and region. Researchers developed a new method that includes the effects of elevation and region.
The amount of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) produced from isoprene released by trees as well as the SOA volatility are more accurately tied to interactions with electron-rich, carbon-based chemicals, known as organic peroxy radicals, that compete with nitrogen oxides in reactions.
Whether inside algae turning biomass to fuels or human cells reacting to radiation exposure, proteins change their shape via atomic motions to perform a specific task. Scientists determined three classes of atomic motion, helping enable discoveries related to biobased or bio-inspired materials for energy production and use.
When heated to just above room temperature, the electrical conductivity of vanadium dioxide abruptly increases by a factor of 10,000. Unusually large lattice vibrations, which are the oscillations of atoms about their equilibrium positions, stabilize this highly conductive metallic phase.
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