University Research | U.S. DOE Office of Science (SC)

Atomic Force Microscope Reveals Chemical Ghosts

A team of chemists and physicists from the University of California, Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has taken snapshots of two molecules reacting on the surface of a catalyst, and found intermediate structures lasting for the 20 minutes or so it takes to snap a photo.

CERN’s Large Hadron Collider is Once Again Smashing Protons and Taking Data

Several thousand physicists worldwide, including a group from Southern Methodist University, are analyzing new proton collision data taken by the LHC to unravel the structure of the Higgs.

UCI Chemists Create Battery Technology with Off-the-Charts Charging Capacity

University of California, Irvine researchers have invented nanowire-based battery material that can be recharged hundreds of thousands of times, moving us closer to a battery that would never require replacement.

UNT Researchers Discover Potential New Paths for Plant-Based Bioproducts

A University of North Texas research team, working as part of the US Department of Energy's BioEnergy Science Center coordinated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, looked into the roles of enzymes that convert amino acids into lignin in Brachypodium, a fast-growing model grass with a sequenced genome.

UT Researcher Sheds Light on 'Cosmic Dark Ages,' Re-Ionization

A team from the University of Texas at Austin are creating a massive simulation of the birth of the universe on the Titan supercomputer cluster housed at the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility. The simulation spans over 300 million cubic light years on a grid made up of 4,096 cells on each axis — over 69 billion cells in total.

Biomass Blues: Breaking Up Not So Hard To Do

Using a chemical crowbar – actually, a solvent – made from the very organic matter it deconstructs, a University of Wisconsin—Madison spinoff business is advancing an audacious effort to convert biomass into three profitable streams of industrial chemicals.

New Method Stabilizes and Enhances Phosphorene

A team at Northwestern University has found that a covalently bonded, single-molecule-thick layer of aluminum oxide prevents phosphorene from degrading and also improves its electronic properties for possible use in transistors, optoelectronics, sensors, or even batteries.

Insect Outbreaks Reduce Wildfire Severity

Surprising new University of Vermont research finds that outbreaks by the mountain pine beetle and western spruce budworm can actually reduce wildfire severity.

Exploring Phosphorene, A Promising New Material

A team including researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) has developed a new method to quickly and accurately determine that orientation using the interactions between light and electrons within phosphorene and other atoms-thick crystals of black phosphorus.

UWM Researchers Create a Better Way to Find Out ‘When’

A new mathematical tool, devised and tested by an international team led by two researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, reduces timing uncertainties during changing events, improving accuracy by a factor of up to 300, with numerous applications.

A One-Stop Shop for Producing and Crystallizing Biomolecules

The Macromolecular Structure Knowledge Center can help researchers who lack equipment for testing hundreds of different crystallization conditions or expertise in working with challenging molecules.

The Light Stuff: A Brand-New Way to Produce Electron Spin Currents

Scientists led by Mingzhong Wu, professor of physics in CSU’s College of Natural Sciences, are the first to demonstrate using non-polarized light to produce what’s called a spin voltage – a unit of power produced from the quantum spinning of an individual electron.