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

Imaging Technique Pulls Plasmon Data Together

Rice University scientists have developed a novel technique to view a field of plasmonic nanoparticles simultaneously to learn how their differences change their reactivity.

Researchers Find Way to Keep Proteins Functioning Outside of the Cell

A team of researchers at Northwestern University and the University of California at Berkeley have discovered a way to keep proteins active outside of a cell. The discovery could lead to a new class of materials with functions found only in living systems.

Plasmons Triggered in Nanotube Quantum Wells

A novel quantum effect observed in a carbon nanotube film could lead to the development of unique lasers and other optoelectronic devices, according to scientists at Rice University and Tokyo Metropolitan University.

Is a Dark Particle the 'Dark Horse' of Dark Matter?

Scientists at UC San Diego are proposing the possibility of a yet-to-be-discovered “dark particle” that could account for both dark matter and a defined discrepancy in the field of physics when it comes to measuring neutron lifetime.

Oxide Materials Discovery May Advance Electronic Device Development

Materials scientists at the University of California, Irvine and other institutions have made a breakthrough discovery in the study of oxide heterostructures, substances that have the potential to revolutionize advanced electronics, memory technologies and photovoltaics.

University of Illinois Team Finds Wigner Crystal—Not Mott Insulator—in 'Magic-angle' Graphene

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have recently shown that the insulating behavior reported by the MIT team has been misattributed. Professor Philip Phillips, a noted expert in the physics of Mott insulators, says a careful review of the MIT experimental data by his team revealed that the insulating behavior of the “magic-angle” graphene is not Mott insulation, but something even more profound—a Wigner crystal.

Better Water Purification Methods Are Aim of New Research Center

With rising demand and dwindling supply, water is perhaps Earth’s most critical natural resource. One way to get more of it is to find more creative approaches — and new materials — to use and reuse existing water and improve upon existing water purification methods. That is the focus of the Center for Materials for Water and Energy SysTems (M-WET), a new multi-university research center headquartered in The University of Texas at Austin’s Cockrell School of Engineering, uniting researchers from UT; the University of California, Santa Barbara; and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Experiments using Diamond Anvils Yield New Insight into the Deep Earth

Earth scientists at Caltech find evidence that suggests subducting slabs of the earth's crust may generate unusual features spotted near the core.

$22 Million for Quantum Research at UChicago and National Labs

The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded more than $22 million to scientists at the University of Chicago, Argonne National Laboratory and Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory for quantum science research, spanning the search for dark matter to more powerful computing.

Rice U. Study Sheds Light On – and Through – 2D Materials

Rice University scientists have now produced a method to determine the properties of atom-thin materials that promise to refine the modulation and manipulation of light.

Success is Sweet: Researchers Unlock the Mysteries of the Sugarcane Genome

For centuries, sugarcane has supplied human societies with alcohol, biofuel, building and weaving materials, and the world’s most relied-upon source of sugar. Now, researchers have extracted a sweet scientific prize from sugarcane: its massive and complex genome sequence, which may lead to the development of hardier and more productive cultivars.

Supercomputer Predicts Optical and Thermal Properties of Complex Hybrid Materials

Materials scientists at Duke University computationally predicted the electrical and optical properties of semiconductors made from extended organic molecules sandwiched by inorganic structures.