Features & Highlights

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ORNL's Communications team works with national, regional, and local media outlets on news stories about the laboratory.

For more information on ORNL and its research and development activities, please refer to one of our Media Contacts. If you have a general media-related question or comment, you can send it to news@ornl.gov.


Unfrozen mystery: H2O reveals a new secret
ORNL neutrons 'paint an altogether new picture of ice'
June 10, 2013 — A collaboration between Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers and a team led by the Carnegie Institution for Science's Malcolm Guthrie has led to discoveries about how ice behaves under pressure, changing ideas that date back almost 50 years. The findings could alter scientists' understanding of how the water molecule responds to conditions found deep within planets and could have implications for energy science. The team's work is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A fragment of the crystal structure of the new ice is shown where the oxygen atoms are blue and the molecular hydrogen atoms pink. Hydrogen atoms that have been pulled off the water molecules are colored gold. These appear to locate in polyhedral voids in the oxygen lattice (one of which is shaded light grey). Previously, these voids were believed to remain even after the water molecule breaks up at enormous pressures.
New family of tiny crystals glow bright in LED lights
ORNL scientist probes atomic structure to improve materials' luminescence efficiency
May 23, 2013 — Minuscule crystals that glow different colors may be the missing ingredient for white LED lighting that illuminates homes and offices as effectively as natural sunlight.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists are using x-ray diffraction analysis to better understand tiny crystals that could be used in warm-white LEDs.
BioEnergy Science Center reaches 500th publication
May 17, 2013 — Researchers with the BioEnergy Science Center led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory have charted 500 scientific publications in peer-reviewed journals in the center's five and half years of operation.

 A book, part of the Wiley Series in Renewable Resources, that was co-written and edited by BioEnergy Science Center researchers marks the 500th publication of the center.
Project with ORNL helps Hardin Valley senior earn Boy Scouts award
May 10, 2013 — Through a project with Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Hardin Valley Academy's Noah Kaye has earned the Boy Scouts of America's Hornaday Award and redbreast sunfish have some new hangouts.

 Hardin Valley Academy senior Noah Kaye worked with Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Neil Giffen to build and install fish attractors that netted Kaye the prestigious Boy Scouts of America Hornaday Award. Hinds Creek was one of the locations for the attractors, which provide cover for sunfish.
Science Saturdays attract hundreds of students for lectures, tours
New ORNL-ORAU program wraps up its first year
May 6, 2013 — Hundreds of science-minded students bypassed Saturday morning cartoons this semester, opting instead to participate in the first year of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Science Saturdays program.

ORNL's Clarina De la Cruz (left) gives a tour of the Spallation Neutron Source to Science Saturday attendees Allison Campbell, Michael Campbell, Krista Barrett and Joseph Gibbs.
Virtual Office Community and Computing Lab
Oak Ridge National Laboratory develops innovative virtual environment for scientific collaboration
April 30, 2013 — The Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors, the Department of Energy's first Innovation Hub, has enlisted top scientists and engineers from around the U.S. to improve the nuclear reactors that provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity.

 Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors staff members Teresa Robison and A.J. Ierulli (on the screen) confer with April Lewis and John Shaw in the VOCC. With the VOCC, researchers who are thousands of miles apart appear to be sitting just across the table -- and communicating with 'true eye contact.'
ORNL analysis predicts losses from extreme weather damage could double by 2050
Researcher tackles unprecedented county-by-county economic loss forecast
April 26, 2013 — U.S. economic losses from extreme weather could at least double by 2050, according to an Oak Ridge National Laboratory analysis published this month in the online edition of the journal Global Environmental Change.

Research in impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability science has the potential to improve preparation for extreme weather events like Superstorm Sandy, which cost dozens of lives and billions of dollars in damages. Image credit: iStockphoto