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Through a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement, the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory and WARD'S Natural Science of Rochester, NY, have developed four science education kits, which are used as hands-on learning tools in the classroom for middle school, high school, and college students. Marketed by WARD'S, the kits focus on environmental chemistry and life science.

Using sophisticated brain-imaging techniques at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, scientists from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), Brookhaven Lab, and the University of Pennsylvania have uncovered the brain chemistry that underlies "cue-induced" craving in cocaine addicts. The work suggests new targets for medications aimed at treating addiction.

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, the New York Structural Biology Center, and SGX Pharmaceuticals, Inc., have determined the atomic crystal structure and functional mechanism of an enzyme essential for eliminating unwanted, non-nutritional compounds such as drugs, industrial chemicals, and toxic compounds from the body. The detailed mechanism of action will help scientists understand how these compounds are eliminated and what goes wrong in cases where normal metabolism fails.

Researchers say improvements they have made to an experimental form of radiation therapy could make the technique, known as microbeam radiation therapy, more effective and eventually allow its use in hospitals.

At the US Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, scientists have proposed a new way of studying the structure of matter down to a level never before observed. Their proposal is the "eRHIC" collider, a planned upgrade to Brookhaven's giant particle accelerator, the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC).

An international collaboration including two physicists from the US Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory has published additional evidence to support the existence of "stripes" in high-temperature (Tc) superconductors. The report in the April 27, 2006, issue of Nature strengthens earlier claims that such stripes -- a particular spatial arrangement of electrical charges -- might somehow contribute to the mechanism by which these materials carry current with no resistance.

When atomic nuclei are smashed together at great speed, resulting temperatures exceed one trillion degrees. Scientists who study nuclear matter under extreme conditions have a particular interest in the properties of particles of light called photons. Using RHIC, Stefan Bathe has measured characteristics of photons to reveal data about the temperature and density of a nuclear collision.

Will scientists ever find the elusive Higgs particle? Are there undiscovered particles "beyond" those described by the Standard Model? Experiments expected to begin next year at CERN will take up the search. Ketevi Assamagan, a physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory will give a talk on the facility's prospects for discovery at the April meeting of the American Physical Society in Dallas, Texas.

Using probes originally designed to detect and image topographical features on surfaces, scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have demonstrated the ability to initiate and spatially localize chemical reactions on the submicron scale. Such "site-selective" chemistry could lead to new ways to etch small-scale electronic circuits, the development of extremely sensitive chemical sensors, as well as a better understanding and control of chemical reactions such as those used to convert sunlight into electricity in solar cells.

Chemists and materials scientists often study "nanotubes" -- capsule-shaped molecules only a few billionths of a meter (nanometers) in width. In nanotube form, many materials take on useful, unique properties, such as physical strength and excellent conductivity. Carbon nanotubes are the most widely investigated variety. Now, in pioneering research, scientists at the US Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have created and investigated the properties of nanotubes made of a different, yet equally interesting material: cerium oxide.