2016 | U.S. DOE Office of Science (SC)

Researchers Improve Performance of Cathode Material by Controlling Oxygen Activity

An international team of researchers has demonstrated a new way to increase the robustness and energy storage capability of a particular class of “lithium-rich” cathode materials—by using a carbon dioxide-based gas mixture to create oxygen vacancies at the material’s surface.

Indiana University Physicists Playing Key Roles in Quest for New Particles

Physicists from Indiana University and Old Dominion University have released a review paper that explores the current state of knowledge on the subatomic particles, quarks and neutrinos, from experiment sites ranging from the Large Hadron Collider to Fermilab and Jefferson Lab.

Study Finds That Plant Growth Responses to High Carbon Dioxide Depend on Symbiotic Fungi

Research by an international team of environmental scientists from the United Kingdom, Belgium and United States, including Indiana University, has found that plants that associate with one type of symbiotic fungi grow bigger in response to high levels of carbon dioxide, or CO2, in the atmosphere, but plants that associate with the other major type of symbiotic fungi do not.

Innovative Tabletop Device Tracks Electron Movement with Unprecedented Accuracy

A collaboration between researchers at UW-Madison, a team at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the University of Colorado at Boulder developed a powerful new device for monitoring subatomic particles

World’s Most Sensitive Dark Matter Detector Completes Search

At a conference in the United Kingdom, scientists with the LUX dark matter experiment present results from the detector’s final 20-month run.

Earlier Snowmelt Reduces Forests’ Ability to Regulate Atmospheric Carbon and Decreases Streamflow Volume

Earlier snowmelt periods associated with a warming climate may hinder subalpine forest regulation of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), according to the results of a new University of Colorado Boulder study.

Novel Capping Strategy Improves Stability of Perovskite Nanocrystals

UC Santa Cruz researchers reported the results of experiments using unique branched ligands to synthesize perovskite nanocrystals with greatly improved stability and uniform particle size.

Scientists Glimpse Inner Workings of Atomically Thin Transistors

With an eye to the next generation of tech gadgetry, a team of physicists at The University of Texas at Austin has had the first-ever glimpse into what happens inside an atomically thin semiconductor device.

New Material Could Advance Superconductivity

Researchers at the Carnegie Institution for Science have experimentally produced a new class of materials blending hydrogen with sodium that could alter the superconductivity landscape and could be used for hydrogen-fuel cell storage.

UB's Wackeroth Named One of Fermilab’s Inaugural Distinguished Scholars

Doreen Wackeroth, University at Buffalo professor of physics, has been named a Fermilab Distinguished Scholar, making her one of the first four researchers to be selected for the honor.

Managing Photosynthesis' Traffic Jams

The Ducat lab at Michigan State University has coaxed a lab-grown cyanobacteria to efficiently make and export sugar, a technique which could someday lead to greater biofuel production at lower cost.

UCR Researchers Discover New Method to Dissipate Heat in Electronic Devices

For the first time, an international team of scientists led by a researcher at the University of California, Riverside has modified the energy spectrum of acoustic phonons— elemental excitations, also referred to as quasi-particles, that spread heat through crystalline materials like a wave—by confining them to nanometer-scale semiconductor structures.