U.S. Department of Energy Research News

Public Release: 15-May-2013
The DOE Joint Genome Institute expands capabilities via new partnerships
Positioning itself to provide the most current technology and expertise to their users in order to address pressing energy and environmental scientific challenges, the DOE Joint Genome Institute announces six projects with which to launch the Emerging Technologies Opportunity Program. These new partnerships span the development of new scalable DNA synthesis technologies to the latest approaches to high throughput sequencing and characterization of single microbial cells from complex environmental samples.

DOE Office of Science

Public Release: 14-May-2013
Saudi Arabia looks to NREL for solar monitoring expertise
Saudi Arabia is planning to move aggressively into renewable energy, with plans to install more solar and wind power in the next 20 years than the rest of the world has installed to date. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is working with the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory for training and expertise in measuring its solar resource.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 9-May-2013

Nature Communications
Flawed diamonds promise sensory perfection
By extending the coherence time of electron states to over half a second, a team of scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the University of California at Berkeley, and Harvard University has improved the performance of one of the most potent sensors of magnetic fields on the nanoscale -- a diamond defect no bigger than a pair of atoms called a nitrogen vacancy center. The achievement is important news for nanoscale sensors and quantum computing.

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Science Foundation, Israeli Ministry of Defense, North Atlantic Treaty Organization Science for Peace

Public Release: 9-May-2013

Science
Heady mathematics
Two UC Berkeley applied mathematicians have found a way to mathematically describe the evolution and disappearance of a foam. Using these equations, they were able to generate a movie that shows the complex draining, popping and rearrangement of these bubbles as the foam vanishes.

US Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, NIH/National Cancer Institute

Public Release: 8-May-2013

Nature Communications
Spintronics discovery
In research that is helping to lay the groundwork for the electronics of the future, University of Delaware scientists have confirmed the presence of a magnetic field generated by electrons which scientists had theorized existed, but that had never been proven until now.

US Department of Energy, National Science Foundation

Public Release: 8-May-2013

Nature
Researchers find a way to make steel without greenhouse-gas emissions
Steelmaking, a major emitter of climate-altering gases, could be transformed by a new process developed at MIT.

American Iron and Steel Institute, US Department of Energy

Public Release: 7-May-2013
NREL quantifies significant value in concentrating solar power
Researchers from the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory have quantified the significant value that concentrating solar power plants can add to an electric grid.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 7-May-2013

Energy & Environmental Science
Combining strategies speeds the work of enzymes
Enzymes could break down cell walls faster -- leading to less expensive biofuels for transportation -- if two enzyme systems are brought together in an industrial setting, new research by the Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory suggests.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 7-May-2013
NREL staff recognized for breakthrough technologies
The Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory recently recognized the professionals behind the lab's greatest innovations from the past year during its Intellectual Property & Technology Transfer Awards.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 6-May-2013
May 2013 story tips from Oak Ridge National Laboratory
The following are story ideas from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory for May 2013.

Public Release: 5-May-2013

Nature Materials
Improving materials that convert heat to electricity and vice-versa
Thermoelectric materials can be used to turn waste heat into electricity or to provide refrigeration without any liquid coolants, and a research team from the University of Michigan has found a way to nearly double the efficiency of a particular class of them that's made with organic semiconductors.

US Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences

Public Release: 5-May-2013

Nature Methods
A new cost-effective genome assembly process
Genome assembly, the molecular equivalent of trying to put together a multi-million piece jigsaw puzzle without knowing what the picture on the cover of the box is, remains challenging due to the very large number of very small pieces, which must be assembled using current approaches. As reported May 5 online in the journal Nature Methods, a collaboration involving DOE JGI researchers has resulted in an improved and fully automated workflow for genome assembly.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 25-Apr-2013

Nature
Bold move forward in molecular analyses
New metrics for analyzing data from small angle scattering experiments should dramatically improve the ability of scientists to study the structures of macromolecules such as proteins and nanoparticles in solution.

US Department of Energy Office of Science, National Institutes of Health

Public Release: 24-Apr-2013

Nature Communications
Speeding the search for better methane capture
Systematic in silico studies have identified several zeolite compounds that show technological promise for capturing methane, the main component of natural gas, that can serve as an ally or an adversary in combating global climate change.

US Department of Energy Office of Science

Public Release: 24-Apr-2013

Energy & Environmental Science
New battery design could help solar and wind power the grid
Researchers from SLAC and Stanford have designed a low-cost, long-life battery that could enable solar and wind energy to become major suppliers to the electrical grid.

US Department of Energy Office of Science, Stanford University, US Department of Energy Joint Center for Energy Storage Research

Public Release: 24-Apr-2013

Energy & Environmental Science
Recipe for low-cost, biomass-derived catalyst for hydrogen production
Researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory describe details of a low-cost, stable, effective catalyst that could replace costly platinum in the production of hydrogen. The catalyst, made from renewable soybeans and abundant molybdenum metal, produces hydrogen in an environmentally friendly, cost-effective manner, potentially increasing the use of this clean energy source.

Department of Energy Office of Science

Public Release: 23-Apr-2013

Nano Letters
Nanowires grown on graphene have surprising structure
When a team of University of Illinois engineers set out to grow nanowires of a compound semiconductor on top of a sheet of graphene, they did not expect to discover a new paradigm of epitaxy. The self-assembled wires have a core of one composition and an outer layer of another, a desired trait for many advanced electronics applications.

US Department of Energy, National Science Foundation

Public Release: 23-Apr-2013

Physical Review Letters
Cause of LED efficiency droop finally revealed
UCSB and Ecole Polytechnique researchers have conclusively identified Auger recombination as the mechanism that causes light emitting diodes to be less efficient at high drive currents.

US Department of Energy, Office of Science

Public Release: 23-Apr-2013
Fertilizer that fizzles in a homemade bomb could save lives around the world
A Sandia engineer who trained US soldiers to avoid improvised explosive devices has developed a fertilizer that helps plants grow but can't detonate a bomb.

Public Release: 19-Apr-2013

Journal of the American Chemical Society
Freedom of assembly
Scientists at the US Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory have, for the first time, captured movies of nanoparticle self-assembly, giving researchers a new glimpse of an unusual material property.

National Science Foundation, US Department of Energy

Public Release: 18-Apr-2013

Science
New solar-cell coating could boost efficiency
New technique developed at MIT could enable a major boost in solar-cell efficiency.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 16-Apr-2013
Softening steel problem expands computer model applications
Sandia National Laboratories worked with the National Nuclear Security Administration's Kansas City Plant on the rapid design of an annealing process to soften stainless steel tubing.

Public Release: 16-Apr-2013

Nature Materials
NREL and partners demonstrate quantum dots that assemble themselves
Scientists from the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory and other labs have demonstrated a process whereby quantum dots can self-assemble at optimal locations in nanowires, a breakthrough that could improve solar cells, quantum computing, and lighting devices. A paper on the new technology, "Self-assembled Quantum Dots in a Nanowire System for Quantum Photonics," appears in the current issue of the scientific journal Nature Materials.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 16-Apr-2013

Scientific Reports
NREL and Stanford team up on peel-and-stick solar cells
It may be possible soon to charge cell phones, change the tint on windows, or power small toys with peel-and-stick versions of solar cells, thanks to a partnership between Stanford University and the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory. A scientific paper, "Peel and Stick: Fabricating Thin Film Solar Cells on Universal Substrates," appears in the online version of Scientific Reports, a subsidiary of the British scientific journal Nature.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 16-Apr-2013

Nature Communications
Lawrence Livermore scientists discover new materials to capture methane
Scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and UC Berkeley and have discovered new materials to capture methane, the second highest concentration greenhouse gas emitted into the atmosphere.