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

Ames Laboratory Celebrates 70 Years of Science and Discovery on Iowa State’s Campus

The U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory is celebrating 70 years on the Iowa State University campus. The close university-laboratory ties have helped recruit researchers, educate students, build research teams and make scientific discoveries possible.

Electroplating Delivers High-Energy, High-Power Batteries

Researchers at the University of Illinois, Xerion Advanced Battery Corporation and Nanjing University in China developed a method for electroplating lithium-ion battery cathodes, yielding high-quality, high-performance battery materials that could also open the door to flexible and solid-state batteries.

Physics Graduate Student Wins National Award, Fellowship

Bethany Matthews, an Oregon State University graduate student studying physics, has recently won a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science Graduate Student Research Award. This prestigious award will see her continue her work on the physics of materials at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado, this summer and into the fall.

Self-Healing Tech Charges Up Performance for Silicon-Containing Battery Anodes

Illinois professors Nancy Sottos and Scott White led a team that developed a silicon nanoparticle composite material for battery anodes that could lead to more reliable and longer-lasting batteries.

Hafnia Dons a New Face

A collaborative University of Kentucky-Texas A&M University team has observed in real-time the transformation of a hafnia nanorod from its room temperature to tetragonal phase at 1000 degrees less than its bulk temperature.

Liquid-Crystal and Bacterial Living Materials Organize and Move in their Own Way

Smart glass, transitional lenses and mood rings are not the only things made of liquid crystals; mucus, slug slime and cell membranes also contain them. Now, a team of researchers is trying to better understand how liquid crystals, combined with bacteria, form living materials and how the two interact to organize and move.

High-Temperature Devices Made from Films that Bend as they “Breathe”

Carrying out maintenance tasks inside a nuclear plant puts severe strains on equipment, due to extreme temperatures that are hard for components to endure without degrading. Now, researchers at MIT and elsewhere have come up with a radically new way to make actuators that could be used in such extremely hot environments.

Study Shows Proteins May Prevent Dysfunction and Disease by Relaxing

A new study by a team of University of Chicago and Notre Dame researchers suggests many proteins remain expanded in the cell, rather than contracting into tight folded shapes.

Filling the Early Universe with Knots Can Explain Why the World is Three-Dimensional

An international team of physicists has developed an out-of-the-box theory that shortly after it popped into existence 13.8 billion years ago the universe was filled with knots formed from flexible strands of energy called flux tubes that link elementary particles together.

Modified Soybeans Yield More in Future Climate Conditions

A three-year field study by University of Illinois researchers found modified soybeans yielded more when subjected to both increased temperature and carbon dioxide levels; however, they found little to no difference between the modified and unmodified soybeans grown in either increased temperature, increased carbon dioxide, or today’s climate conditions.

Sandwiched Between Superconductors, Graphene Adopts Exotic Electronic States

MIT physicists have found that a flake of graphene, when brought in close proximity with two superconducting materials, can inherit some of those materials’ superconducting qualities.

New Plutonium Discovery Lights Way for FSU Chemistry Professor’s Work to Clean Up Nuclear Waste

Florida State University Professor Thomas Albrecht-Schmitt and a team of researchers have been studying plutonium — Pu on the Periodic Table of Elements — for almost two decades to understand how it behaves chemically, and how it differs from lighter elements like iron or nickel.