Focus: Hidden - Tennessee

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New science-based standards for identifying human remains based on X-rays was the subject of a recent “MTSU On the Record” radio program.

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Paul A. Northcott, Ph.D., selected for support as a promising early-career scientist focused on cancer research.

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The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) Inorganic Chemistry Division has published a Provisional Recommendation for the names and symbols of the recently discovered superheavy elements 113, 115, 117, and 118.

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Questions are cropping up about the Summer Games of the XXXI Olympiad, scheduled for Aug. 5 to 21 in Rio de Janeiro. More than 100 doctors, researchers and health experts signed an open letter published June 3 urging the World Health Organization to either move the summer games from Rio de Janeiro or to delay them, saying they are concerned about the Zika virus’ potential impact on global health.

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An elusive massless particle could exist in a magnetic crystal structure, revealed by neutron and X-ray research from a team of scientists led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Tennessee.

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital reports that higher blood concentrations of methotrexate during cancer treatment are associated with brain changes and impaired executive function in survivors of pediatric leukemia.

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Vanderbilt biologist Kenneth Catania has accidentally discovered that can electric eels make leaping attacks that dramatically increase the strength of the electric shocks they deliver and, in so doing, has confirmed a 200-year-old observation by famous 19th century explorer and naturalist Alexander von Humboldt.

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New battery technology a boost for Formula E race cars; New ORNL roof coating helps keep roofs cool; ORNL technique reveals defects in solar cell material; ORNL finding shows promise for alternating current conduction for oxide electronics.

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Researchers have developed aluminum alloys that are both easier to work with and more heat tolerant than existing products.

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital investigators report promising preliminary results at the annual meeting of ASCO for an experimental monoclonal antibody when combined with chemotherapy for newly diagnosed patients.

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Ethnocentrism is carrying Donald Trump to the Republican nomination for president, although it may condemn him to defeat in the November election, says Vanderbilt University political scientist Cindy D. Kam. Ethnocentrism is the tendency to partition the human world into in-groups and out-groups: into “us” against “them.” These groups might be based on nationality, race-ethnicity, or religion, or any other salient social category.

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A collaboration between GE and the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF) is contributing to efficiency gains in GE’s H-class gas turbines. These are currently the world’s largest and most efficient gas turbines, capable of converting fuel and air into electricity at more than 62 percent power-plant efficiency. GE researchers recently used the OLCF's Titan supercomputer to develop advanced modeling and simulation techniques of the combustion that takes place at high temperature and pressure during gas-turbine power generation. The predictive accuracy of GE’s new simulation methods is allowing the company to evaluate more combustor design concepts within the product cycle than ever before.

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In most cases, a catalyst that’s good at driving chemical reactions in one direction is bad at driving reactions in the opposite direction. However, a team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory has created the first high-performance, two-way oxide catalyst.

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The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory will open an office at EPB headquarters in Chattanooga’s Innovation District that will link local companies to the national laboratory’s resources and expertise.

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A team led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory used neutron analysis to better understand a protein implicated in the replication of HIV, the retrovirus that causes AIDS. The enzyme, known as HIV-1 protease, is a key drug target for HIV and AIDS therapies. The multi-institutional team used neutron crystallography to uncover detailed interactions of hydrogen bonds at the enzyme’s active site, revealing a pH-induced proton ‘hopping’ mechanism that guides its activity.

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A new study provides the first-ever evidence that women who reveal personal family-related information that could explain gaps in their resume (like staying home to raise a child) dramatically raise their chances of getting hired compared to a women who focus on their resume credentials alone.

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ORNL demonstrates a method to produce significant amounts of semiconducting nanoparticles for light-emitting displays, sensors, solar panels and biomedical applications.

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Joining carbon fiber composites and aluminum for lightweight cars and other multi-material high-end products could become less expensive because of an ORNL method that harnesses a laser’s power and precision.

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New research from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital shows support interventions by child life specialists decrease sedation use and costs associated with cranial radiation therapy.

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RMX Technologies of Knoxville, Tenn., and the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have signed an exclusive licensing agreement for a new technology that dramatically reduces the time and energy needed in the production of carbon fiber.

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The Tennessee Poison Center (TPC) housed at Vanderbilt University Medical Center reported the number of essential oil exposures doubled between 2011 and 2015 and 80 percent of cases involved children.

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital used advanced pharmacologic modeling and simulation for the first time to translate promising laboratory results into a phase I clinical trial for pediatric brain tumor patients.

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists report the first evidence that a pathogen-specific antibiotic was less disruptive to the gut microbiome than broad-spectrum antibiotics.

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The results of a new study make it far less likely that KIC 8462852, popularly known as Tabby’s star, is the home of industrious aliens who are gradually enclosing it in a vast shell called a Dyson sphere.

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Sheila Taylor leaned in to see the baby’s heartbeat rhythm. She watched as the baby’s heartbeat line fell without a corresponding spike showing the mother’s uterus contracting down on it.

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Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and their collaborators used neutron scattering to reveal magnetic moments in hybrid topological insulator (TI) materials at room temperature, hundreds of degrees Fahrenheit warmer than the extreme sub-zero cold where the properties are expected to occur. The discovery promises new opportunities for next-generation electronic and spintronic devices such as improved transistors and quantum computing technologies.

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Complicated new regulations added to complicated old regulations won’t protect the United States’ financial system from frightening crashes like that experienced in 2008, says a Vanderbilt professor who helped the Obama administration pull the financial sector out of that morass. Instead, “a much simpler and more surgical approach is needed,” said Morgan Ricks of Vanderbilt Law School, author of The Money Problem: Rethinking Financial Regulation (The University of Chicago Press).

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A team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory detected a feature in a solid electrolyte and experimentally verified its importance to fast ion transport. The work points out a new strategy for design of highly conductive solid electrolytes.

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ORNL's GLIDES features advanced energy storage technology; Old tires get new life in sodium-ion batteries; Silicon carbide shows promise for reactor fuel, core structures; ORNL, Boeing collaboration delivers impressive results

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In an election season that will shatter the record for money spent on a presidential campaign, political scientists at Vanderbilt and UCLA have created SpotCheck, a new approach for assessing political ads using internet-based surveys. “We now can present evidence as opposed to speculation about the impact of a political spot,” says John Geer, the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of Political Science at Vanderbilt, who is partnering with Professor of Political Science Lynn Vavreck at UCLA on this new approach.

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Rio is a California sea lion who can solve IQ tests that many people have trouble passing. In fact, she is so smart that scientists at the Long Marine Lab at the University of California, Santa Cruz designed a series of tests that prove she is the first animal besides humans that can use basic logic (If A=B and B=C then A=C).

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Research led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital could help to expand precision medicine by identifying cancer patients who should avoid the chemotherapy drug asparaginase.

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Neutron scattering and computational modeling have revealed unique and unexpected behavior of water molecules under extreme confinement that is unmatched by any known gas, liquid or solid states.

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This profile of an early career physicist highlights her research in developing new gas jet targets for use in next-generation nuclear physics experiments.

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The oceans hold more than four billion tons of uranium—enough to meet global energy needs for the next 10,000 years if only we could capture the element from seawater to fuel nuclear power plants. Major advances in this area have been published.

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Early results suggest novel gene therapy is safe and effective for treatment of inherited immune disease, according to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

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Research led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists may set the stage for new approaches to control or prevent the inflammation and tissue damage associated with the chronic autoimmune disorder lupus

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Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are taking a closer look at how sturgeon, a prehistoric—and now imperiled—group of fish species may better be helped to get around the dams that block their migrations.

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Standardizing hospital care policies across institutions for infants diagnosed with drug withdrawal symptoms at birth reduces their length of treatment and hospitalization, according to new collaborative research led by Vermont Oxford Network, Vanderbilt and the University of Michigan Health System.

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In a study led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory, scientists synthesized a stack of atomically thin monolayers of two lattice-mismatched semiconductors and created an atomically thin solar cell.

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An anonymous donor has pledged $5,000,000 to establish the Dean’s Chair in Engineering at Vanderbilt University’s School of Engineering, Chancellor Nicholas S. Zeppos announced at the school’s annual distinguished alumni celebration dinner April 14.

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Four Department of Energy national laboratories are joining Oak Ridge National Laboratory to expand an online crowdsourcing community for building technologies called JUMP, which bridges the gap between cutting-edge ideas and the marketplace.

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Researchers and others interested in establishing a sustainable bioeconomy in the U.S. are taking part in a five-day study tour led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

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Newly identified mechanism may offer ways to enhance the immune response to fight cancer or strengthen long-term protection provided by vaccines

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Researchers used neutrons to uncover novel behavior in materials that holds promise for quantum computing. The findings provide evidence for long-sought phenomena in a two-dimensional magnet.

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Researchers have found a potential path to further improve solar cell efficiency by understanding the competition among halogen atoms during the synthesis of sunlight-absorbing crystals.

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Vanderbilt’s Asthma, Sinus and Allergy Program (A.S.A.P) has seen an increase in the number of patients being treated for alpha-gal syndrome, commonly known as the red meat allergy linked to tick bites.

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Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory found new ways to influence selectivity for specific charged ions. Better selectivity to enhance discrimination between metals, such as sodium and cesium, could improve future environmental cleanup efforts.

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ORNL researchers focus on minimizing impact of natural and man-made disasters hit; Aberrated probes helping to detect magnetic properties in materials; Thermoelectric heat pump dryer potentially uses 40 percent less energy; ORNL researchers discover structures designed to monitor fish movement are potential obstacles