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Examining a long-lived forest, researchers have found that black spruce trees, which dominate the northern forests of North America, succumb about five years after being weakened by environmental stresses. Without rejuvenating fire, the dead trees aren't being replaced by new ones. The result will help researchers better understand how climate change affects forest health, and how forests affect the severity of climate change. It also suggests trees might be storing more carbon than currently estimated.

The newest catalytic converters in diesel engines blast away a pollutant from combustion with the help of ammonia. Common in European cars, the engines exhaust harmless nitrogen and water. How they do this hasn't been entirely clear. Now, new research shows that the catalyst attacks its target pollutant in an unusual way, providing insight into how to make the best catalytic converters.

PNNL chemists have unexpectedly made two differently colored crystals -- one orange, one blue -- from one chemical in the same flask while studying a special kind of molecular connection called an agostic bond. The discovery reported this week in Angewandte Chemie International Edition provides industrial chemical reactions such as those that occur while making plastics and fuels.

An injection of carbon dioxide, or CO2, has begun at a site in southeastern Washington to test deep geologic storage. Battelle researchers based at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory are injecting 1,000 tons of CO2 one-half mile underground to see if the greenhouse gas can be stored safely and permanently in ancient basalt flows.

A new study in PLOS ONE that examined food poisoning infection as-it-happens in mice revealed harmful bacteria, such as a common type of Salmonella, takes over beneficial bacteria within the gut amid previously unseen changes to the gut environment. The results provide new insights into the course of infection and could lead to better prevention or new treatments.