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

Primordial Cosmic Soup Easier to Create than Previously Thought

In a series of experiments at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory, physicists have found the signature of this primordial liquid, called the quark gluon plasma (QGP), in subatomic collisions at much lower energies and in much smaller volumes than those at which it has previously been detected.

Sunlight and the Right Microbes Convert Arctic Carbon into Carbon Dioxide

A new study published this week in Nature Communications outlines the mechanisms and points to the importance of both sunlight and the right microbial community as keys to converting permafrost carbon to CO2.

Researchers Develop Dynamic Templates Critical to Printable Electronics Technology

Researchers at the University of Illinois have developed bio-inspired dynamic templates used to manufacture organic semiconductor materials that produce printable electronics.

Advanced Materials Power Next-Generation Molecular Separations

Researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology identified the opportunities they see ahead for scalable membrane materials based on rigid and engineered pore structures.

“Bad Metal” Offers Clues to High-Temperature Superconductivity

A Stony Brook University PhD student and a team of scientists found that “stripes” of electronic charge, which may play a key role in superconductivity, persist across surprisingly high temperatures, shape conductivity, and have direction-dependent properties.

Howe Receives 2017 MSU Innovation Center Award

Dr. Gregg Howe, an MSU Foundation Professor at the MSU-DOE Plant Research Laboratory and the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, has been awarded the 2017 Innovation of the Year for his pioneering work challenging a long-held assumption that plants cannot both grow and defend optimally at the same time.

How Some Battery Materials Expand Without Cracking

A team of researchers at MIT, the University of Southern Denmark, Rice University, and Argonne National Laboratory may have determined why fairly brittle electrode materials in batteries don’t crack under the strain of expansion and contraction cycles when they are used and recharged.

LSU Among the Top Universities to Receive Energy Department Graduate Research Awards

LSU is one of five universities in the U.S. with more than one graduate student awarded funding from the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science Graduate Student Research, or SCGSR, program.

Proton-Nuclei Smashups Yield Clues About ‘Quark Gluon Plasma’

Findings from Rice University physicists working at Europe’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) are providing new insight about an exotic state of matter called the “quark-gluon plasma” that occurs when protons and neutrons melt.

400 Million Years of a Stable Relationship: Clues to the Molecular Basis of Balance in AM Symbiosis

Researchers at the Boyce Thompson Institute studying the interaction of root systems with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi have determined that transcription factors control a degeneration process that regulates the stability of the root-and-fungi symbiosis.

Research Links Decline in Hemlock Forests to Changes in Water Resources

An insect infestation that is killing hemlock trees in New England forests is having a significant impact on the water resources of forested ecosystems that provide essential water supplies to one of the nation's most populous regions, according to research by Indiana University geographers and colleagues at three universities in Massachusetts.

Computer Models Provide New Understanding of Sickle Cell Disease

Simulations developed by Brown University mathematicians provide new details of how sickle cell disease manifests inside red blood cells, which could help in developing new treatments.