2017 | U.S. DOE Office of Science (SC)

Puzzling Patches in Earth’s Interior Billions of Years in the Making

A chemical reaction between ancient seawater and iron in Earth’s mantle over eons could explain the formation of mysterious blobs in the planet’s interior that dampen passing seismic waves, Stanford researchers say.

$1.1M DOE Grant Will Help Beef Up Biofuels Through Evolutionary Approaches

Researchers at Michigan State University will use a $1.1 million U.S. Department of Energy grant to fight disease in switchgrass by identifying regions of the genome that cause disease resistance. Locating these disease-fighting regions will help improve switchgrass’ viability.

Bioenergy Giant Sorghum is High in Yield and Potential

Scientists at the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) found sorghum has the potential to help produce yet another good thing: environmentally sustainable, bio-based chemicals and fuels.

World’s Smallest Neutrino Detector Finds Big Physics Fingerprint

After more than a year of operation at the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), the world’s smallest neutrino detector has found a big fingerprint of the elusive, electrically neutral particles that interact only weakly with matter.

4 Elements Make 2-D Optical Platform

Rice University scientists have discovered a two-dimensional alloy with an optical bandgap that can be tuned by the temperature used to grow it.

Corrosion in Real Time

Using a device called the Surface Forces Apparatus (SFA), University of California Santa Barbara researchers get a nanoscale glimpse of crevice and pitting corrosion as it happens.

Caltech Grad Student Makes Ultra-Sensitive Measurement of Deformation

Xiaoyue Ni, who studies materials science in the lab of Julia R. Greer, a Caltech professor of materials science and mechanics, has shown that metals undergo permanent deformation even prior to yielding—the threshold at which a material under strain becomes permanently deformed.

Research Shows Global Photosynthesis on the Rise

University of California Merced scientist Elliott Campbell and an interdisciplinary, international team of scientists discovered a chemical record of global photosynthesis, by analyzing the gases trapped in layers of Antarctic snow. They estimate that the sum of all plant photosynthesis on Earth grew by 30 percent over the 200-year record they captured.

X-Ray Study Reveals Long-Sought Insights Into Potential Drug Target

Wei Liu and his colleagues at ASU’s Biodesign Institute, along with a team led by Haitao Zhang and Vadim Cherezov of USC have examined one promising drug target in luminous detail, using a device known as an X-ray free electron laser, or XFEL.

Securing the Future

University of South Carolina chemistry researcher Hans-Conrad zur Loye's work has culminated in the creation of the Center for Hierarchical Waste Form Materials, which will develop storage materials that can contain nuclear waste for thousands of years.

Artificial Topological Matter Opens New Research Directions

An international team of researchers have created a new structure that allows the tuning of topological properties in such a way as to turn on or off these unique behaviors. The structure could open up possibilities for new explorations into the properties of topological states of matter.

To E-, or not to E-, the Question for the Exotic “Si-III” Phase of Silicon

New work led by Carnegie’s Tim Strobel and published in Physical Review Letters shows that one form of silicon, called Si-III (or sometimes BC8), which is synthesized using a high-pressure process, is what’s called a narrow band gap semiconductor.