Archived Story Tips for 2012
For more information on ORNL and its research and development activities, please refer to the resources listed below or to one of our Media Contacts. If you have a general media-related question or comment, you can send it to news@ornl.gov.
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Disaster Response—Limiting access . . .
Ensuring that only people who have legitimate business are allowed to enter areas hit by floods, hurricanes or other disasters is a big challenge, but Credentialing 2.0 offers a software solution.
Energy—New MAXLAB facility complete . . .
Residential and commercial buildings of tomorrow could use less energy because of research that will be performed at the new $16 million Maximum Building Energy Efficiency Research Laboratory at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Medical—Results in seconds . . .
Detecting parasites in biological or medical samples has never been faster than when using a dime-sized microchip developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Purdue University.
Supercomputing—Research time on Titan . . .
Oak Ridge National Laboratory is home to Titan, a supercomputer ranked No.
Imaging—Marker-less motion correction . . .
Medical scans of children and people with Parkinson's or Alzheimer's disease could have greater clarity because of a technology developed by researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Environment—Ozone affecting watersheds . . .
U.S.
CLIMATE—-Advancing modeling . . . . . .
ENERGY—-Research homes on market . . . . . .
ETHANOL—-Unexpected test results . . . . . .
Electricity—Spotlight on outages . . .
Automotive—Calculate your trip . . .
Instrumentation—Focus on perfection . . .
Lighting—Next-generation source . . .
Energy—Revolutionary heat pump . . .
Supercomputing—The real oxygen-23 . . .
Vehicles—Charging on the move . . .
Combustion—Hitting on all cylinders . . .
Data—Straight to the source . . .
Renewables— Boost for biofuels . . .
Biosurveillance—Filling the gaps . . .
Supercomputing—Ramping up realism . . .
Biology—Waterlogged protein . . .
Electronics—Quantum leap in security . . .
Materials—Steel shield . . .
Nuclear Energy—Supercomputer speeds path forward . . .
Materials—Atomic hybrids . . .
Materials—Transparent performance . . .
Computing—Decoding the materials genome . . .
Energy—Industrial strength savings . . .
Supercomputing—Lower costs, less toxicity . . .
Engineering—Ceramics put to the test . . .
Military—Energy boot camp . . .
Nanotechnology—Manipulating light . . .
Environment—Putting seashells to work . . .
Materials—Shaping tomorrow . . .
Biology—When neutrons and simulation unite . . .
Microscopy—Transfer stage solution . . .
Electricity—Grid game changer . . .
Superconductors—Surprising transitions . . .
Fusion—Taking the heat . . .
Biology—Tracking mercury . . .
March 2012 Story Tips - Batch 2
Materials—POWGEN open for business . . .
Chemistry—Unraveling methane's structure . . .
Biology—Model tells the story . . .
Chemistry—Workshop helps student earn publication . . .
Physics—Searching for 'supersolidity' . . .
Energy—Designing tomorrow's water heater . . .
Detectors—Saving lives . . .
Superconductors—Surprising transitions . . .
Physics—ORNL scores six papers . . .
Superconductivity—VULCAN delivers . . .
Biotechnology—Regenerating skin, muscle . . .
Heath—Virus response to pH changes . . .
Fusion—Supporting ITER systems . . .
Neutrons—Examining nanoporous carbons . . .
Materials—Next-generation electronics . . .
Supercomputing—Optimization tools . . .
Biofuels—Mega biomass . . .
Biology—Tailoring toxicity of nanoparticles . . .
Neutrons—Analyzing the antibacterial assault . . .
Environment—Permafrost peril . . .
Biofuels—Coast Guard going green . . .
Materials—Revealing artifacts’ secrets . . .
Materials—Unexpected excitations . . .
Soft Matter—Tracking cell death protein . . .
Soft Matter—Biologically inspired solar cells . . .
A committee formed by the National Academy of Sciences and the National Research Council has released a report, http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13430,
When four of the nation's most energy-efficient houses are sold, the new homeowners can opt to allow the research project to continue, providing additional data that could make houses of tomorrow even better.
Ethanol blends of 10 to 25 percent could potentially have more fuel pump compatibility issues than higher blends, according to a study conducted by a team led by Mike Kass of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Fuels and Engines Research Group.
When a storm knocks out power, among the first questions to be answered are how many people are affected and when electricity will be restored.
Fueleconomy.gov's new "My Trip Calculator" (http://www.fueleconomy.gov/trip/) is an interactive trip calculator and mapping tool that helps travelers pl
Through a cooperative research and development agreement, Hinds Instruments and Oak Ridge National Laboratory are refining a microscope that can play a role in the success of next-generation nuclear reactors.
A team from the University of California at Santa Barbara has used NOMAD, the new Nanoscale-Ordered Materials Diffractometer at the Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, to study the potential of a green-yellow emitting oxyfluoride solid solution phosphor for high-quality solid-state lighting.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Oklahoma's
ClimateMaster Inc.
To really understand the mundane world we live in
we must also understand matter at the edge of the
nuclear landscape.
Owners of electric cars could kiss that cumbersome
cord goodbye without losing efficiency because of
a proprietary technology developed at Oak Ridge
National Laboratory.
With the first demonstration of a dual-fuel
advanced combustion cycle in a modified multi-
cylinder engine, researchers have moved closer to
delivering on the promise of increased fuel
efficiency and reduced emissions.
Data archived at Oak Ridge National Laboratory can
now be more effectively discovered, used and
tracked through a new research resource from
Thompson Reuters.
U.S.
Experts from universities, labs, industry and
first responders will gather in Washington, D.C.,
this month to share ideas and develop strategies
to protect against biological attacks.
A special report (see link below) shows speedups
of 1.5- to 3-fold for most scientific application
codes running on extreme-scale hybrid
supercomputers using code accelerators largely
developed for the video game industry.
Proteins' biological functions, such as the ability to metabolize drugs in our bodies, are known to rely heavily on the presence of water, but mechanisms behind the relationship have remained unclear.
Intrusion detection is moving up a couple of notches with a technology that overcomes one of the main vulnerabilities of conventional security systems.
A protective coating developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory can extend the life of costly cutting and boring tools by more than 20 percent, potentially saving millions of dollars over the life of a project.
By using graphic processing units in a test bed for the Titan supercomputer, researchers have more than tripled the speed of a code designed to improve efficiency, longevity and safety of nuclear reactors.
Atom-by-atom studies of a two-dimensional hybrid material at Oak Ridge National Laboratory are paving the way toward novel low-power electronics.
Windshields, windows, solar panels, eyeglasses, heart stents and hundreds of other products representing a multi-billion-dollar market are potential targets for Oak Ridge National Laboratory's thin-film superhydrophobic technology.
A hybrid supercomputer capable of 10 to 100 petaflops, or a quadrillion calculations per second, can support the Materials Genome Initiative, says Jeongnim Kim of Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Wireless sensors that could help the steel industry save money and reduce energy use and emissions are being put to the test at Commercial Metals Co.
Discovery of new drugs requires the screening of thousands of compounds to identify hundreds of candidates that are winnowed to dozens of effective agents.
Researchers from Corning Inc.
U.S.
Tiny rod-like nanoparticles of gold or silver able to adsorb, transmit and reflect light at the nanoscale could hold the key to faster computers, higher-resolution microscopes, more efficient light-emitting diodes and a new generation of chemical and biological detectors.
Millions of seashells off the coast of Japan may be able to play a role in cleaning up radioactive cesium that was dumped into the ocean after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami off the coast of Japan.
Shape-memory alloys are an engineer's dream — materials that shape-shift spontaneously to accommodate changing operating conditions.
Scientific analysis of proteins, the workhorses of the cellular world, could become easier by uniting experimental and simulation techniques, according to research published in Biophysical Journal.
Preserving the integrity of air- or moisture-sensitive samples being transferred from a protective environment to a scanning electron microscope is now easier with a vacuum-tight transfer stage invented at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Waste and inefficiencies in the nation's electric grid could be dramatically reduced with the implementation of a magnetic amplifier being developed by a team led by Aleks Dimitrovski of Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Energy and Transportation Science Division.
Neutron scattering experiments performed on iron-based superconducting material at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Canada's Chalk River Laboratories have unveiled surprising changes in the materials' subatomic structural and magnetic properties when subjected to relatively low pressures.
The United States is responsible for 8 percent of the Toroidal Field Conductor that the huge experimental fusion reactor now being built in France requires.
How to clean up the mercury in the environment is a major issue for the Department of Energy.
The Spallation Neutron Source's Powder Diffractometer POWGEN has launched a rapid access sample mail-in system for users who use the flexible general-purpose instrument for a wide range of structural studies of novel materials.
Considering how ubiquitous it is on earth, methane (natural gas) at the molecular level is a scientific unknown.
Casein micelles in milk, stabilized by molecules of kappa-casein, are the building blocks of dairy products such as yogurt and cheese and the vehicle for delivering calcium phosphate to newborns.
An Oregon State University graduate student has successfully turned her participation in a two-day POWGEN Neutron Diffraction workshop at Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Spallation Neutron Source into a published paper in the Journal of Solid State Chemistry.
Theoretical physicists have long predicted the existence of a quantum state of matter they call "supersolidity," in which solid helium-4 loses its viscosity and flows like a liquid.
Consumers and the environment could ultimately be the beneficiaries of a high-efficiency CO2 heat pump water heater concept being researched by General Electric and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
About 2,500 people still die each year in residential fires, but that number could be reduced with a smart fire alarm that can immediately distinguish between fires and nuisances.
Neutron scattering experiments performed on iron-based superconducting material at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Canada's Chalk River Laboratories have unveiled surprising changes in the materials' subatomic structural and magnetic properties when subjected to relatively low pressures.
The Journal of Condensed Matter Physics has put out a special issue on the dynamics of water and glass-forming liquids that features six ORNL neutron sciences research collaborations.
Neutron testing of the Japanese-made superconducting cable for the Central Solenoid magnetic system for U.S.
Researchers at the Bio-SANS instrument at the High Flux Isotope Reactor used contrast variation and small-angle neutron scattering to get a first insight into how macromolecules form single polyelectrolyte chains in synthetic complexes.
The Sindbis virus, or SINV, is the prototype for viruses spread by insects, which cause some of the most devastating and widespread diseases among humans.
U.S.
Several recent papers describe how Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher Yuri Melnichenko and his collaborators continue to use neutrons and small-angle neutron scattering to bore through geological materials such as nanoporous carbons to understand their unique properties as storage media for greenhouse gases and for hydrogen in fuel cells used in transportation.
Changing the behavior of a material isn't big magic – it's nanoscale chemistry.
An upgrade is transforming Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Jaguar supercomputer, America's fastest, into Titan, a next-generation supercomputer that will employ the latest AMD Opteron central processing units as well as NVIDIA Tesla graphics processing units — energy-efficient processors that accelerate specific types of calculations in scientific application codes.
Molecular-level studies of tension wood formation in poplars could ultimately fuel the discovery of biomass crops with thicker cell walls, less lignin and more cellulose that can be converted into ethanol.
By selectively applying different coatings, scientists have discovered they can influence the toxicity of particles on mouse cell lines from the lung and immune system.
A combination of advanced techniques at Oak Ridge National Laboratory helped researchers gain a better understanding of how some proteins attack bacteria.
Carbon trapped in the top few meters of permafrost soils across nearly 19 million square kilometers of northern regions could be released at a rate of about two to five times greater than previous estimates.
To comply with the mandate to increase the use of alternative fuels, the Coast Guard has enlisted the help of Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers with expertise in fuels and engines.
Bronze and brass artifacts excavated at the ancient city of Petra have been imaged in three dimensions using neutrons at the High Flux Isotope Reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
A clearer understanding of magnetic interactions in insulating materials can help in developing magnets for motors in electric vehicles and can enhance the performance of magnets in many other devices.
Cell death, or apoptosis, is a naturally occurring and necessary biological process.
Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory's High Flux Isotope Reactor are getting a leg up in their research from an ingenious "low-tech" lighting tool using LEDs that, when fixed to their samples and pushed directly into the neutron beam, illuminate the response of layers of cyanobacteria to changes in light.
