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

New Research Finds Cause of Alloy Weakness

For years, materials scientists have been perplexed by the question of why alloys don’t meet their full potential strength. New research has found the answer to this problem with a study done as a collaboration between researchers at Binghamton University, the University of Pittsburg, the University of Michigan and Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Watching Atoms Move in Hybrid Perovskite Crystals Reveals Clues to Improving Solar Cells

A team of researchers led by the University of California San Diego has for the first time observed nanoscale changes deep inside hybrid perovskite crystals that could offer new insights into developing low-cost, high-efficiency solar cells.

New X-ray Spectroscopy Explores Hydrogen-Generating Catalyst

Using a newly developed technique, researchers from Japan, Germany and the U.S. have identified a key step in production of hydrogen gas by a bacterial enzyme. Understanding these reactions could be important in developing a clean-fuel economy powered by hydrogen.

Researchers Pin Down One Source of a Potent Greenhouse Gas

A study of a Lake Erie wetland suggests that scientists have vastly underestimated the number of places methane-producing microbes can survive—and, as a result, today’s global climate models may be misjudging the amount of methane being released into the atmosphere.

On the Origins of Star Stuff: HAWC Collaboration Sheds Light on Origin of Anti-Matter

Michigan Tech team and others use a high-altitude observatory in Mexico to better understand where gamma rays come from.

Researchers Image Quasiparticles that Could Lead to Faster Circuits, Higher Bandwidths

A research team led by Iowa State University's Zhe Fei has made the first images of half-light, half-matter quasiparticles called exciton-polaritons.

WVU Biologists Team Up to Research New Bioproducts

West Virginia University biologists are part of a $40 million Department of Energy effort to create sustainable, cost-effective bioproducts through four new bioenergy research centers.

Perseverance Pays Off in Fight Against Deadly Lassa Virus

A team led by Staff Scientist Kathryn Hastie and Professor Erica Ollmann Saphire at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has solved the structure of the viral machinery that Lassa virus uses to enter human cells.

New Delta Scuti: Rare Pulsating Star 7,000 Light Years Away is 1 of Only 7 in Milky Way

Discovered at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, a star — as big as or bigger than our sun — in the Pegasus constellation is expanding and contracting in three different directions simultaneously on a scale of once every 2.5 hours, the result of heating and cooling of hydrogen fuel burning 28 million degrees Fahrenheit at its core.

New Method to Detect Ultrasound with Light

Developed by Northwestern Engineering scientists, a tiny, transparent device that can fit into a contact lens, called the Micro-ring resonator detector, can determine the speed of the blood flow and the oxygen metabolic rate at the back of the eye.

UMD Physicist Improves Method for Designing Fusion Experiments

A University of Maryland physicist has made an important revision to software tools used to design stellarators, which will balance tradeoffs between the ideal magnetic field shape and potential coil shapes, leaving more space between the coils for repair access and sensor placement.

Researchers Develop Best-Yet Cell Culture System for Age-Related Macular Degeneration

An international team from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and University College London and Queens University Belfast in the United Kingdom developed a cell culture model that could help to develop earlier treatment strategies for age-related macular degeneration, the third most prevalent cause of vision loss worldwide.