University Research | U.S. DOE Office of Science (SC)

Rules for Superconductivity Mirrored in 'Excitonic Insulator'

Rice University physicists dedicated to creating the working components of a fault-tolerant quantum computer have succeeded in creating a previously unseen state of matter.

Physicists Excited by Discovery of New Form of Matter, Excitonium

By developing a novel technique, researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; University of Illinois; University of California, Berkeley; and University of Amsterdam have measured for the first time the collective excitations of the low-energy bosonic particles and observed the precursor to exciton condensation, a soft plasmon phase.

Hyperlens Crystal Capable of Viewing Living Cells in Unprecedented Detail

Construction of instruments with an optical lens so powerful that it lets you view features the size of a small virus on the surface of a living cell in its natural environment is now possible because of a fundamental advance in the quality of an optical material used in hyperlensing, a method of creating lenses that can resolve objects much smaller than the wavelength of light.

MACHOs are Dead. WIMPs are a No-show. Say Hello to SIMPs.

The intensive, worldwide search for dark matter, the missing mass in the universe, has so far failed to find an abundance of dark, massive stars or scads of strange new weakly interacting particles, but a new candidate is slowly gaining followers and observational support.

‘Magnetoelectric’ Material Shows Promise as Memory for Electronics

University of Wisconsin-Madision researchers and international collaborators have created a unique process for making a high-quality magnetoelectric material and are now able to view the changing electric and magnetic properties switching in real time.

Researchers Model Optimal Amount of Rainfall for Plants

A team of researchers, led by Stephen Good, a hydrologist at Oregon State University, have determined what could be considered a “Goldilocks” climate for rainfall use by plants: not too wet and not too dry.

Quantum Leap: Novel Computational Approach Launches New Paradigm in Electronic Structure Theory

A group of Michigan State University (MSU) researchers specializing in quantum calculations has proposed a radically new computational approach to solving the complex many-particle Schrödinger equation that holds the key to explaining the motion of electrons in atoms and molecules.

Stabilizing Energy Storage

University of Utah and University of Michigan chemists, participating in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint Center for Energy Storage Research, predict a better future for a type of battery for grid storage called redox flow batteries.

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The Search for Dark Matter Continues

University of Texas at Arlington physics professor Kaushik De has been working with scientists all over the world to find dark matter with the world’s largest scientific instrument, the Large Hadron Collider.

Delving Into the Atomic Realm

Using a one-of-a-kind, handmade microscope, Wilson Ho, University of California, Irvine’s Donald Bren Professor of Physics & Astronomy and Chemistry, and his graduate students succeeded in imaging halogen bonds in real space.

Lead Dressed Like Gold: Laser-Altered Molecules Cast Alchemy in a Different Light

Using advanced computational theory, a Princeton research team has developed a method called "spectral dynamic mimicry" that allowed them to calculate the laser pulse shape to produce any desired spectral output to make non-permanent changes to a substance’s molecules, mimicking the reflective properties of another substances’ s molecules.

Microscopic Defects Make Batteries Better

High-performance electrodes for lithium-ion batteries can be improved by paying closer attention to their defects — and capitalizing on them, according to Rice University scientists.