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Researchers at the Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) have identified a tropical rainforest microbe that can endure relatively high concentrations of an ionic liquid used to dissolve cellulosic biomass for the production of advanced biofuels. They've also determined how the microbe accomplishes this, a discovery that holds broad implications beyond biofuels.

The US Department of Energy is interested in the perennial grass switchgrass as a prospective biofuels feedstock, but the plant genome is complex. The DOE Joint Genome Institute has sequenced plant genomes of related candidate bioenergy crops such as sorghum and the model grass Brachypodium but they last shared a common ancestor with switchgrass more than 20 million years ago. The genome of a much closer switchgrass relative -- foxtail millet -- is described in Nature Biotechnology.

NDCX-II, the recently completed second generation Neutralized Drift Compression Experiment at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, is a compact accelerator whose dense ion beam will be able to deliver a powerful punch for producing warm dense matter – a step on the road to heavy-ion nuclear fusion. Research with NDCX-II will make advances in the acceleration, compression, and focusing of intense ion beams to guide this promising approach to fusion energy power production.

Cells regulate their functions by adding or subtracting phosphates from proteins. If scientists could study the process in detail, in individual cells over time, understanding and treating diseases would be greatly aided. Formerly this was impossible without damaging the cells or interfering with the process itself, but at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientists have achieved the goal by using the Advanced Light Source's bright infrared beams and a technique called Fourier transform spectromicroscopy.

Berkeley Lab researchers have directed the first self-assembly of nanoparticles into multi-layered thin films of gold that are device-ready for potential applications in computer memory storage, energy harvesting, energy storage, remote-sensing, catalysis, light management and plasmonics.

A 3.2 billion-pixel digital camera designed is now one step closer to reality. The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope camera, which will capture the widest, fastest and deepest view of the night sky ever observed, has received "Critical Decision 1" approval by the US Department of Energy to move into the next stage of the project.

Berkeley researchers have developed a technique for encapsulating liquids of nanocrystals between layers of graphene so that chemical reactions in the liquids can be imaged with an electron microscope. With this technique, movies can be made that provide unprecedented direct observations of physical, chemical and biological phenomena that take place in liquids on the nanometer scale.