U.S. Department of Energy Research News

Public Release: 11-Oct-2012
University of Tennessee receives DOE funds to improve nuclear safety
The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, will take part in two US Department of Energy projects totaling more than nine million dollars which involve a team of institutions to improve upon nuclear energy safety and efficiency.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 10-Oct-2012

Journal of Forensic Sciences
Cold cases heat up through Lawrence Livermore approach to identifying remains
In an effort to identify the thousands of John/Jane Doe cold cases in the United States, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researcher and a team of international collaborators have found a multidisciplinary approach to identifying the remains of missing persons.

Public Release: 10-Oct-2012

ACS Nano
Improving nanometer-scale manufacturing with infrared spectroscopy
While there have been significant breakthroughs in nano-manufacturing, there has been much less progress on measurement technologies that can provide information about nanostructures made from multiple integrated materials. Researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Anasys Instruments Inc. now report new diagnostic tools that can support cutting-edge nano-manufacturing. Using atomic force microscope based infrared spectroscopy to characterize polymer nanostructures and systems of integrated polymer nanostructures, researchers were able to chemically analyze polymer lines as small as 100 nm

DARPA, Air Force Office of Scientific Research, US Department of Energy

Public Release: 10-Oct-2012

Nature Chemistry
The best of both catalytic worlds
Berkeley Lab researchers have combined the best properties of heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysts by encapsulating metallic nanoclusters within the branched molecular arms of dendrimers. The results are heterogenized homogeneous nanocatalysts that are sustainable and feature high reactivity and selectivity.

US Department of Energy/Office of Science

Public Release: 8-Oct-2012

Plant Physiology
Computational model IDs potential pathways to improve plant oil production
Using a computational model they designed to incorporate detailed information about plants' interconnected metabolic processes, scientists at the US Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have identified key pathways that appear to "favor" the production of either oils or proteins. The research, now published online in Plant Physiology, may point the way to new strategies to tip the balance and increase plant oil production.

US Department of Energy/Office of Science

Public Release: 8-Oct-2012
Grant-winning PPPL scientists lead fusion to the edge
A center based at the US Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory has won a highly competitive $12.25 million grant to develop computer codes to simulate a key component of the plasma that fuels fusion energy. The five-year DOE award could produce software that helps researchers design and operate facilities to create fusion as a clean and abundant source of energy for generating electricity.

US Department of Energy/Office of Science

Public Release: 8-Oct-2012

Nature Methods
A welcome predictability
Berkeley Lab researchers have developed an adapator that makes the genetic engineering of microbial components substantially easier and more predictable.

National Science Foundation

Public Release: 4-Oct-2012

Nature Physics
Lawrence livermore experiments illuminate how order arises in the cosmos
One of the unsolved mysteries of contemporary science is how highly organized structures can emerge from the random motion of particles. This applies to many situations ranging from astrophysical objects that extend over millions of light years to the birth of life on Earth.

Public Release: 4-Oct-2012

C3E Women in Clean Energy Symposium
C3E award winners announced at Women in Clean Energy Symposium
An MIT and DOE symposium highlighted women's increasing leadership in energy research, industry and government.

MIT Energy Initiative, US Department of Energy

Public Release: 4-Oct-2012

Advanced Energy Materials
Researchers reveal how solvent mixtures affect organic solar cell structure
Controlling "mixing" between acceptor and donor layers, or domains, in polymer-based solar cells could increase their efficiency, according to a team of researchers that included physicists from North Carolina State University.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 4-Oct-2012
Story tips from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, October 2012
These are story ideas from recent research from the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Public Release: 2-Oct-2012
Iowa Powder Atomization Technologies wins John Pappajohn Iowa Business Plan Competition
Iowa Powder Atomization Technologies, a start-up company based on technology developed at the Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory, has won the 2012 John Pappajohn Iowa Business Plan Competition. The competition honors top business plans of companies in business for four years or less, with an aim of stimulating business development. The prize includes $25,000 in seed money.

Public Release: 2-Oct-2012

Physical Review Letters
Ames Laboratory finds ordered atoms in glass materials
Scientists at the US Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory have discovered the underlying order in metallic glasses, which may hold the key to the ability to create new high-tech alloys with specific properties.

US Department of Energy Office of Science

Public Release: 28-Sep-2012

Physical Review Letters
Probing the mysteries of cracks and stresses
Analysis of molecular-level fracture and stress mechanisms could have broad implications for understanding materials' behavior.

US Department of Energy/Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors

Public Release: 28-Sep-2012
UA engineering leads $5.5 million DOE project to create low-cost solar energy
Solar power may be clean and renewable, but solar panels are inefficient and do not work at night. Could concentrated solar power be the salty solution?

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 27-Sep-2012

Nano Letters
Nickelblock: An element's love-hate relationship with battery electrodes
Battery materials on the nano-scale reveal how nickel forms a physical barrier that impedes the shuttling of lithium ions in the electrode, reducing how fast the materials charge and discharge. Published last week in Nano Letters, the research also suggests a way to improve the materials.

Department of Energy

Public Release: 25-Sep-2012
Wayne State University researcher's calculations will help unlock new energy sources
A Wayne State University researcher is part of a national project to find accessible sources of natural gas. Jaewon Jang, Ph.D., assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering in the College of Engineering, recently received a two-year, $178,000 grant from the US Department of Energy to aid in the search for methane hydrates in oceans and permafrost, such as the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska's North Slope.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 24-Sep-2012

Physical Review Letters
A clock that will last forever
Imagine a clock that will keep perfect time forever or a device that opens new dimensions into the study of quantum phenomena such as emergence and entanglement. Berkeley Lab researchers have proposed a space-time crystal based on an electric-field ion trap and the Coulomb repulsion of particles that carry the same electrical charge.

National Science Foundation

Public Release: 24-Sep-2012
Most biofuels are not 'green'
First tops, then flops. That is one way of summing up the history of biofuels so far. A new study led by Empa gives an up-to-date picture of the ecobalance of various biofuels and their production processes. Only a few are overall more environmentally friendly than petrol.

Swiss Federal Authorities, US Department of Energy

Public Release: 20-Sep-2012

Nano Letters
ORNL research uncovers path to defect-free thin films
A team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Ho Nyung Lee has discovered a strain relaxation phenomenon in cobaltites that has eluded researchers for decades and may lead to advances in fuel cells, magnetic sensors and a host of energy-related materials.

Public Release: 19-Sep-2012

Nature
World record holder
Northwestern University scientists have developed a thermoelectric material that is the best in the world at converting waste heat to electricity. This is very good news once you realize nearly two-thirds of energy input is lost as waste heat. The material could signify a paradigm shift. With a very environmentally stable material that is expected to convert 15 to 20 percent of waste heat to useful electricity, thermoelectrics now could see more widespread adoption by industry.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 17-Sep-2012
World's most powerful digital camera opens eye, records first images in hunt for dark energy
Scientists in the international Dark Energy Survey collaboration announced this week that the Dark Energy Camera, the world's most powerful digital camera, has achieved first light. The camera is mounted on the Blanco telescope in Chile, and the first pictures of the southern sky were taken by the 570-megapixel camera on Sept. 12.

US Department of Energy

Public Release: 17-Sep-2012
Berkeley Lab sensors enable first light for the dark energy camera
Mounted on a telescope high in the Andes, the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) saw first light September 12. DECam's half-billion-pixel focal plane is made of Berkeley Lab CCDs, invented and developed by scientists and engineers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and descended from sensors developed for high-energy physics. Highly sensitive to the near-infrared region of the spectrum, Berkeley Lab CCDs are an essential component of the most powerful dark-energy survey instrument yet made.

Department of Energy Office of Science, National Science Foundation, Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, National Optical Astronomy Observatory

Public Release: 17-Sep-2012

Physical Review Letters
Dry-run experiments verify key aspect of Sandia nuclear fusion concept
Magnetically imploded tubes, intended to help produce controlled nuclear fusion at scientific "break-even" energies or better within the next few years, have functioned successfully in preliminary tests.

Sandia Laboratory-Directed Research and Development Program, National Nuclear Security Administration

Public Release: 13-Sep-2012
Water-wise biofuel crop study to alter plants metabolic, photosynthesis process
A five-year, multi-institutional $14.3 million United States Department of Energy grant to explore the genetic mechanisms of crassulacean acid metabolism and drought tolerance in desert-adapted plants was awarded to a team of researchers including John Cushman, a biochemistry professor at the University of Nevada, Reno; Xiaohan Yang at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL); James Hartwell at the University of Liverpool, UK; and Anne Borland at Newcastle University, UK and ORNL. They aim to apply this knowledge to biofuel crops.

US Department of Energy, Genome Scineces