2019

Superconductors, the Future of Low-cost Energy, Focus of Newly Awarded Grant

The University of Alabama at Birmingham Department of Physics was awarded $635,964 from the United States Department of Energy to continue research into improving the control and efficiency of energy production, storage and use by connecting theoretical and experimental physics of superconductor materials to find more proficient ways to transport energy.

The Secret Life of Batteries

Koffi Pierre Yao, a new assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Delaware, is uncovering novel insights about what happens inside the batteries that power our smartphones, laptops, and electric vehicles.

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Researchers Flood Boundaries of Chemistry

With new funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, researchers at UC San Diego are collecting data on the properties of materials, like water, apply it to machine learning, optimize the material through modifications based on simulations and then synthesize an ideal material that could be used, for example, to extract water from the atmosphere.

SRU Students and Faculty Collaborate on Research Project at Berkeley Lab

Thanks to a faculty-student research grant from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and a connection between a Slippery Rock University computer science professor and a Berkeley employee, three SRU students were hired as temporary Berkeley employees, joining the more than 4,200 scientists, engineers, faculty, postdoctoral scholars and graduate and undergraduate students currently on staff.

X-rays Reveal Why Adding a Bit of Salt Improves Perovskite Solar Cells

A team of researchers has reported new findings about perovskites that could pave the way to developing low-cost, high-efficiency solar cells. Using high-intensity X-ray mapping, they explain why adding small amounts of cesium and rubidium salt improves the performance of a promising class of solar cell materials, called lead-halide perovskites.

Predicting the existence of Heavy Nuclei Using Machine Learning

A collaboration between the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) and the Department of Statistics and Probability (STT) at Michigan State University (MSU) estimated the boundaries of nuclear existence by applying statistical analysis to nuclear models, and assessed the impact of current and future FRIB experiments.

UK Research Probes Nanomaterials in Plants at Cellular Level

A national team of scientists, led by University of Kentucky’s Jason Unrine, used the most powerful X-ray microscope on the planet to discover how nanomaterials enter and move within tomato plants on the cellular level.

Running an LED in Reverse Could Cool Future Computers

In a finding that runs counter to a common assumption in physics, researchers at the University of Michigan ran a light emitting diode (LED) with electrodes reversed in order to cool another device mere nanometers away.

Researchers Create Ultra-lightweight Ceramic Material That Can Better Withstand Extreme Temperatures

UCLA researchers and collaborators at eight other research institutions have created an extremely light, very durable ceramic aerogel. The material could be used for applications like insulating spacecraft because it can withstand the intense heat and severe temperature changes that space missions endure.