A team at the Advanced Quantum Testbed at Berkeley Lab (in collaboration with UC Berkeley and Yale) developed an architectural blueprint for a novel quantum processor based on fluxonium qubits, which outperform the most widely used superconducting qubits. Furthermore, they simulated two types of logic gates to validate the performance of the proposed fluxonium blueprint.
The Quantum Systems Accelerator has issued an impact report that details progress made since the center launched in 2020. Highlights include a record-setting quantum sensor that could be used to hunt dark matter, a machine learning algorithm to correct qubit errors in real time, and the first observation of several exotic states of matter using a 256-atom quantum device.
About 12% of the total global energy demand comes from heating and cooling homes and businesses. A new study suggests that using underground water to maintain comfortable temperatures could reduce consumption of natural gas and electricity in this sector by 40% in the U.S. The approach, called aquifer thermal energy storage (ATES), could also help prevent blackouts caused by high power demand during extreme weather events.
Seven Berkeley Lab scientists contributed to research behind a new United Nations report that says limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels requires cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 – and that we have the tools to make a difference now.
A whole new world of antibiotics is waiting inside the viruses that infect bacteria. Our scientists are making it easier to study them.
Scientists at Berkeley Lab have developed a polymer coating that could enable longer lasting, more powerful lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles. The advance opens up a new approach to developing EV batteries that are more affordable and yet easy to manufacture.
A team from Berkeley Lab and Florida State University has designed a new blueprint for solid-state batteries that are less dependent on specific chemical elements. Their work could advance efficient, affordable solid-state batteries for electric cars.
Since the 1970s, scientists have known that copper has a special ability to transform carbon dioxide into valuable chemicals and fuels. But for many years, scientists have struggled to understand how this common metal works as an electrocatalyst, a mechanism that uses energy from electrons to chemically transform molecules into different products.
Society’s growing demand for high-voltage electrical technologies—including pulsed power systems, cars and electrified aircraft, and renewable energy applications—requires a new generation of capacitors that store and deliver large amounts of energy under intense thermal and electrical conditions. Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Scripps Research have now developed a new polymer-based device that efficiently handles record amounts of energy while withstanding extreme temperatures and electric fields.
A recent study by climate scientists from the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory aims to inform the discussion around how protecting additional land to meet conservation goals may impact land use (such as agricultural) and land cover (such as grass, water, or vegetation). The research is among the first to explore how potential pathways to achieve these bold targets affect agricultural expansion, and its findings suggest that meeting the 30% protection targets could lead to substantial regional shifts in land use and in some cases still fail to protect the world’s most biodiverse hotspots.
Modeling the effects of earthquakes on homes, businesses, and infrastructure is about to get a lot easier, thanks to advanced simulations performed on the world's fastest supercomputers.
Excitons are drawing attention as possible quantum bits (qubits) in tomorrow’s quantum computers and are central to optoelectronics and energy-harvesting processes. However, these charge-neutral quasiparticles, which exist in semiconductors and other materials, are notoriously difficult to confine and manipulate. Now, for the first time, Berkeley Lab researchers have created and directly observed highly localized excitons confined in simple stacks of atomically thin materials. The work confirms theoretical predictions and opens new avenues for controlling excitons with custom-built materials.
A new battery material that dissolves in water will make it simple and economical to recycle a wide range of batteries, so we can reuse the valuable and increasingly rare materials within, including nickel and cobalt.
Fans of science history can now access a new gem: a 20-minute video interview with the father of the Big Bang theory, Georges Lemaître. European broadcast network VRT found the 20-minute recording that is thought to be the only video of Lemaître. His interview, originally aired in 1964 and conducted in French, has now been transcribed and translated into English by physicists at Berkeley Lab and the Vatican Observatory.
Graduate student intern Meg Slattery is working with researchers in Berkeley Lab’s Lithium Resource Research and Innovation Center to develop a new research blueprint – inspired by energy justice – as they explore the Salton Sea’s potential as a renewable source of lithium for battery production.
Tropical forests are crucial for sucking up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But they’re also subject to intense storms that can cause “windthrow” – the uprooting or breaking of trees. A new study finds that more extreme thunderstorms from climate change will likely cause a greater number of large windthrow events in the Amazon, which could impact the rainforest's ability to serve as a carbon sink.
There are so many unknowns about long COVID. Why is the range of symptoms so vast? How do pre-existing conditions play a role? Scientists have developed a machine learning tool to accelerate discoveries using actual patient data.
As semiconductor devices become ever smaller, researchers are exploring two-dimensional materials for potential applications in transistors and optoelectronics. Controlling the flow of electricity and heat through these materials is key to their functionality, but first we need to understand the details of those behaviors at atomic scales. Now, researchers have discovered that electrons play a surprising role in how energy is transferred between layers of 2D semiconductor materials tungsten diselenide and tungsten disulfide.
Researchers at Berkeley Lab have developed a new kind of heating and cooling method that they have named the ionocaloric refrigeration cycle. They hope the technique will someday help phase out refrigerants that contribute to global warming and provide safe, efficient cooling and heating for homes.
One of the most highly-attended workshops at the 2022 IEEE Quantum Week was organized by researchers from the Advanced Quantum Testbed (AQT) at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (Berkeley Lab). Motivated by deep scientific inquiry and technological needs, the one-day hybrid workshop was titled “Classical Control Systems for Quantum Computing.”
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