From the bluebird painting propped against her office wall and the deer she mentions seeing outside her office window, Linda Lewis might be mistaken for a wildlife biologist at first glance. But rather than trailing animal tracks, Lewis, a researcher at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, is more interested in marks left behind by humans.
With more than 30 patents, James Klett is no stranger to success, but perhaps the Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher’s most noteworthy achievement didn’t start out so hot – or so it seemed at the time.
Andrew Stack, a geochemist at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, advances understanding of the dynamics of minerals underground.
Scientists at the US Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are learning how the properties of water molecules on the surface of metal oxides can be used to better control these minerals and use them to make products such as more efficient semiconductors for organic light emitting diodes and solar cells, safer vehicle glass in fog and frost, and more environmentally friendly chemical sensors for industrial applications.
Throw a rock through a window made of silica glass, and the brittle, insulating oxide pane shatters. But whack a golf ball with a club made of metallic glass—a resilient conductor that looks like metal—and the glass not only stays intact but also may drive the ball farther than conventional clubs. In light of this contrast, the nature of glass seems anything but clear.
Complex oxides have long tantalized the materials science community for their promise in next-generation energy and information technologies. Complex oxide crystals combine oxygen atoms with assorted metals to produce unusual and very desirable properties.
In 2015, American consumers will finally be able to purchase fuel cell cars from Toyota and other manufacturers. Although touted as zero-emissions vehicles, most of the cars will run on hydrogen made from natural gas, a fossil fuel that contributes to global warming.
If such a designation existed, Nazanin Bassiri-Gharb would be on the fast track to becoming an Oak Ridge National Laboratory “super user.” Her research on nanoscale materials has taken her all across the ORNL campus, from scanning probe and electron microscopes at the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences to neutron reflectometry at the Spallation Neutron Source and radiation equipment in the Materials Science and Technology Division.
Old thinking was that gold, while good for jewelry, was not of much use for chemists because it is relatively nonreactive. That changed a decade ago when scientists hit a rich vein of discoveries revealing that this noble metal, when structured into nanometer-sized particles, can speed up chemical reactions important in mitigating environmental pollutants and producing hard-to-make specialty chemicals.
The Spallation Neutron Source at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory broke records for sustained beam power level as well as for integrated energy and target lifetime in the month of June.