News By Location

News from DC

Select a state to view local articles and features

Jump start your science career: DOE applications for 2025 student internships now open

DOE/US Department of Energy
Grant and Award Announcement

Applications are currently being accepted for the Spring 2025 term of two programs offered by the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science (SC): the Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internships (SULI) program and the Community College Internships (CCI) program.

Research offers new insights into the mechanisms of how quarks combine

DOE/US Department of Energy

Groups of three quarks form stable composite particles called baryons (such as protons and neutrons), while pairs of quarks form unstable mesons. New measurements from the Large Hadron Collider beauty (LHCb) experiment show surprising variations in the rate at which baryons are produced, defying previous expectations. This finding helps to explain the creation of the first stable particles in the early universe.

Journal: Physical Review Letters

Ab initio methods help scientists make sense of complex particle collisions

DOE/US Department of Energy

New research finds that ab initio methods using effective field theory can be used to study the scattering of protons and neutrons off atomic nuclei. The research specifically examined the scattering of protons from carbon-12 and oxygen-16 at low energies.

Journal: Physical Review C

U.S. Department of Energy issues request for proposals for contractor to manage and operate Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility

DOE/US Department of Energy
Grant and Award Announcement

Today, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced the issuance of a Request for Proposals (RFPs) for the competitive selection of a management and operating contractor for the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (TJNAF).

Scientists gain new molecular-level insights into breaking down plant material for biofuels

DOE/US Department of Energy

To produce biofuels from nonedible plants, researchers can use cellulase to break down plant cellulose into glucose, which can be fermented to generate bioethanol. Researchers have now used a specialized optical microscope to visualize single cellulase enzymes interacting with different forms of cellulose. This allowed them to investigate enzyme function in the presence of the product of the reaction and other components of plant biomass.

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

By mimicking cicada wings, scientists are investigating new ways to keep patients safe

DOE/US Department of Energy

Cicada’s cries ring out in the hot air and their discarded exoskeletons decorate tree branches in the southeast and midwest United States at the height of summer. While their ability to emerge in huge numbers is astounding, they have other surprising features too. In fact, their wings kill bacteria on contact and are self-cleaning. Researchers using the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory user facilities investigated this bizarre phenomenon. They learned how structures in the cells are able to pull off such a feat and how it could be used in medical applications.

Deep learning model overcomes the challenge of real-world measurements of isotope production target cooling systems

DOE/US Department of Energy

Isotope production facilities depend on cooling for proper function of target systems during irradiation. Examining these systems is challenging due to high radiation levels during target irradiation that make real-world measurements impossible. Researchers turned instead to a mock apparatus to collect temperatures and high-speed video of cooling water boiling, then used deep-learning tools to validate a model that predicts boiling in cooling systems.

Journal: International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

How sticky is dense nuclear matter?

DOE/US Department of Energy

Theorists have performed the first systematic study of whether and how the viscosity of quark gluon plasma from heavy nuclei collisions changes over a wide range of collision energies. The calculations predict that the fluid’s viscosity increases with net-baryon density. The results will help researchers probe the entire phase diagram of nuclear matter.

Journal: Physical Review Letters

Summer in the city: climate science reveals the impacts of heat

DOE/US Department of Energy

The summer sun beats down. People without air conditioning must find refuge in schools and community centers. Outdoor workers struggle to keep cool. Hot nights interrupt people’s sleep, not allowing them to get the rest needed to recover from the warmth of the day. People with cardiovascular and respiratory illnesses have these conditions worsen.

New experimental results set the stage for understanding the mysterious history of NGC 2419

DOE/US Department of Energy

The NGC 2419 globular cluster contains potassium and magnesium in ratios not found in other, similar globular clusters. Scientists have so far been unable to find the source for this unexpected pattern. However, previous uncertainties in the potassium-hydrogen fusion reactions hindered the predictions of stellar models. This new study offers crucial experimental insights that enable refined stellar models to probe the peculiarities of NGC 2419.

Journal: Physical Review Letters

13
14
15
16
17