2018 | U.S. DOE Office of Science (SC)

WVU Physicists Awarded $1.34 Million to Develop Machine-learning Software

The researchers, James Lewis and Aldo Romero from the Department of Physics and Astronomy, will lead a team from WVU, University of Southern California and Kitware, Inc. to develop new machine-learning tools for advancing chemical and materials science discoveries on the nation’s future high-speed computing platforms.

Replacing Hard Parts in Soft Robots

Researchers at Harvard University develop 'soft' valves to make entirely soft robots.

Discovery Opens the Possibility of Using Sunlight to Turn a Greenhouse Gas into Fuel

A team of scientists has discovered a single-site, visible-light-activated catalyst that converts carbon dioxide (CO2) into “building block” molecules that could be used for creating useful chemicals.

To Understand Watersheds, the Amazon Flood Plain is Her Laboratory

Earth sciences Ph.D. student Emily Burt will advance her research into the Amazon River watershed, studying how sulfur makes its way across the South American continent.

Broad Genome Analysis Shows Yeasts Evolving by Subtraction

A team of researchers led by labs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Vanderbilt University sequenced and compared the genomes of 332 species of budding yeasts, all members of a subphylum of yeasts that multiply by producing daughter cells from buds on their surface.

Amazonian Peatlands May Soon Switch from a Carbon Sink to a Carbon Source

Researchers at Arizona State University have discovered land-use disturbances may reverse the effect of the most efficient natural carbon sink on the planet.

'Magnetic Topological Insulator' Makes its Own Magnetic Field

A team of U.S. and Korean physicists has found the first evidence of a two-dimensional material that can become a magnetic topological insulator even when it is not placed in a magnetic field.

SUNY Poly Professors Awarded $330,000 for Two Distinct Cutting-Edge Nanotechnology-Centered Research Projects

Dr. Serge Oktyabrsky received $200,000 from the U.S. Department of Energy to develop next-gen scintillation detectors based on quantum dots to enable a better understanding of basic particles. Dr. Spyros Gallis received $130,000 from the National Science Foundation to develop critical material and physical properties of new erbium-doped silicon carbide photonic nanostructures for enhanced biological imaging, quantum communications applications.

U of A Partners With DoE, National Labs in New Field of Topological Materials

University of Arkansas physicists are exploring the new field of “topological quantum materials,” which are unusual in that they have a robustness of electrical properties regardless of temperature shifts or changes in structural form.

Rare and Diverse Giant Viruses Unexpectedly Found in a Forest Soil Ecosystem

biologist Jeff Blanchard and Ph.D. student Lauren Alteio at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, with others at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Joint Genome Institute (JGI), discovered giant viruses – relatively speaking the size of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons – in soil at Harvard Forest in Petersham, Massachusetts.

Quantum Sound Waves to Open Door for More Powerful Sensors

In a first, scientists with the Institute for Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory have built a mechanical system—a tiny “echo chamber” for sound waves—that can be controlled at the quantum level, by connecting it to quantum circuits.

Microbial Community Members Play Distinct Roles in Biosynthesis

Insights into a microbial metabolic network set the stage for designing microbiomes to synthesize desired bioproducts.