Brookhaven National Laboratory (DOE)
Researchers demonstrate source of blinking in quantum dots
November 8, 2011 4:16 am | News | CommentsNot all quantum dots are created equal, however—some, called simply "bad" quantum dots, blink in an irregular, unreliable way. This unreliability makes them problematic to work with. Researchers at Brookhaven National Laboratory's Center for Functional Nanomaterials have just figured out why bad dots are so unreliable.
Pioneering supercomputer QCDOC retires
October 31, 2011 6:00 am | News | CommentsAfter years of forefront calculations that shed light on much breakthrough physics at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider and other vital physics, the retired giant supercomputer QCDOC, for quantum chromodynamics (QCD) on a chip, regenerates in the newest, more powerful pioneering supercomputer, QCDCQ (QCD with chiral quarks).
Scientists target bacteria 'quorum sensing' as route to antibacterial therapies
October 25, 2011 7:11 am | News | CommentsAmong the complex molecular processes involved in the development of bacteria-borne disease is quorum sensing, the way bacteria communicate and coordinate collective behaviors. By studying how to inhibit quorum sensing, scientists may be able create antibacterial pharmaceuticals for a variety of ailments.
Energy that drives the stars comes closer to Earth
October 20, 2011 4:01 am | News | CommentsHeavy-ion fusion, a special approach to creating fusion for electrical power production, has long been the choice of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory accelerator physicists. Now the near prospect of "burn and gain" at the National Ignition Facility, plus a forthcoming National Academies report on inertial confinement fusion energy, have spurred new interest in heavy-ion fusion.
Impurity atoms introduce waves of disorder in exotic electronic material
October 18, 2011 4:37 am | News | CommentsBrookhaven National Laboratory scientists reveal how substituting just a few atoms can cause widespread disruption of the delicate electron interactions that give a particular "heavy fermion" material its unique properties, including superconductivity.
Researchers debut glass reactor to study battery materials synthesis
September 29, 2011 4:55 am | News | CommentsA team of Brookhaven National Laboratory researchers has fabricated a transparent chemical reactor vessel that may give scientists in many fields a window into real-time chemistry. Scientists in the Lab's Energy Storage Group recently used the transparent reactor to study the synthesis of lithium iron phosphate for rechargeable batteries.
Scientists detect unusual 'quasiparticles' in tri-layer graphene
September 26, 2011 4:35 am | News | CommentsBy studying three layers of graphene stacked in a particular way, scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have discovered a “little universe” populated by a new kind of “quasiparticles”—particle-like excitations of electric charge. Unlike massless photon-like quasiparticles in single-layer graphene, these new quasiparticles have mass, which depends on their energy, and would become infinitely massive at rest.
Scientists solve long-standing plant biochemistry mystery
September 20, 2011 4:37 am | News | CommentsScientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory and collaborators at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden have discovered how an enzyme "knows" where to insert a double bond when desaturating plant fatty acids. Understanding the mechanism—which relies on a single amino acid far from the enzyme's active site—solves a 40-year mystery of how these enzymes exert such location-specific control.
Nanoimprinting controls orientation of organic solar polymers
September 12, 2011 4:57 am | News | CommentsAs scientists attempt to improve the performance of organic photovoltaic devices they’ve discovered that how the molecules stack up can make a big difference. Scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have shown nanoimprinting imparts a sense of order among the polymer chains, orienting them in a preferred configuration that should improve solar cell performance.
A material's magnetic surprise could mean new technologies
August 30, 2011 5:57 am | by Laura Mgrdichian | News | CommentsScientists working at the National Synchrotron Light Source have discovered an unusually fragile, unstable magnetic state in a member of a class of materials known for its robust magnetic behaviors. Their discovery could lead to applications in the emerging field of spintronics.
LHC experiments eliminate more Higgs hiding spots
August 22, 2011 12:45 pm | News | CommentsOn Monday, scientists collaborating on the ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider said their research excluded with 95% certainty the existence of a Higgs boson over most of the mass region from 145 to 466 GeV. This significantly narrows the mass region in which the Higgs boson could be hiding.
Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment begins taking data
August 15, 2011 4:58 am | News | CommentsThe Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment has begun its quest to answer some of the most puzzling questions about the elusive elementary particles known as neutrinos. The experiment's first completed set of twin detectors is now recording interactions of antineutrinos as they travel away from the powerful reactors of the China Guangdong Nuclear Power Group in southern China.
Stage integration broadens TEM horizons
August 14, 2011 8:00 pm | Award WinnersBrookhaven National Laboratory and Nanofactory Instruments AB have solved the major engineering challenge necessary to integrate optoelectronic and imaging capabilities within the confined space of a high-resolution TEM, adding a variety of new capabilities.
Modeling plant metabolism to optimize oil production
July 26, 2011 5:29 am | News | CommentsScientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have developed a computational model for analyzing the metabolic processes in rapeseed plants—particularly those related to the production of oils in their seeds. Their goal is to find ways to optimize the production of plant oils that have widespread potential as renewable resources for fuel and industrial chemicals.
Rare coupling of magnetic and electric properties in a single material
July 25, 2011 5:38 am | News | CommentsResearchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have observed a new way that magnetic and electric properties can coexist in a special class of metals. These materials, known as multiferroics, could serve as the basis for the next generation of faster and energy-efficient logic, memory, and sensing technology.
Link between competing phases in cuprates leads to new theory
July 21, 2011 10:28 am | News | CommentsA team of scientists studying the parent compound of a cuprate (copper-oxide) superconductor has discovered a link between two different states, or phases, of that matter—and written a mathematical theory to describe the relationship. This work is expected to help scientists predict the material's behavior under varying conditions, and may help explain how it’s transformed into a superconductor able to carry current with no energy loss.
Scientists to assemble Kbase to aid U.S. biofuel, environment efforts
July 18, 2011 9:40 am | News | CommentsA multi-institutional team has been awarded government funding to create out of many separate streams of biological information a single, integrated cyber-"knowledgebase" (called Kbase) focused specifically on two fundamentally important forms of life.
Columbia engineers control light propagation in photonic chips
July 11, 2011 9:39 am | News | CommentsResearchers at Columbia University’s Engineering School have built optical nanostructures that enable them to slow photons down and fully control light dispersion. They have shown that it is possible for light (electromagnetic waves) to propagate from point A to point B without accumulating any phase, spreading through the artificial medium as if the medium is completely missing in space.
Using sound to mount microcrystals for X-ray diffraction
July 7, 2011 4:56 am | News | CommentsBrookhaven National Laboratory researchers are using high-frequency sound waves in conjunction with extremely bright X-rays to get a look at the atomic structures of the complex biological molecules that make our bodies work.
When matter melts
June 24, 2011 4:36 am | News | CommentsWhen the universe was only millionths of a second old, quarks moved freely in a hot, dense soup of quarks and gluons, but soon protons and neutrons and other forms of ordinary matter "froze out" of this quark-matter soup. Now scientists have compared quantum theory and data from the STAR experiment for the first time to map out the energies and temperatures where ordinary matter melts and the quark-gluon plasma freezes.
500-year-old hair tells story of royal mercury poisoning
June 23, 2011 4:25 am | News | CommentsHair breaks. It singes. It falls out. It might not be the strongest feature of living human bodies, but hair is one of the best-preserved tissues of dead ones, providing a record of diet, age, metabolism, and sometimes, even the cause of death. With intense beams of x-rays at Brookhaven's National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS), a team of researchers is using hair samples collected from the decomposed bodies of two 15th-century Italian royals to determine how they really died.
LHC achieves 2011 data milestone
June 17, 2011 6:36 am | News | CommentsOn June 17, 2011, the amount of data accumulated by LHC experiments ATLAS and CMS clicked over from 0.999 to 1 inverse femtobarn, signaling an important milestone in the experiments' quest for new physics.
Bacteria’s sticky appendages suggest drug targets
June 3, 2011 5:58 am | News | CommentsIn 2008, a research team published the first complete structure of the protein complex that transports sticky appendages, or pili. Now, the Brookhaven Lab-led group has solved the puzzle of how the bacteria are able to do this. It’s an important finding because these pili allow bacteria like E. coli to infect human organs.
Nanoscience research may lead to better auto tires
May 24, 2011 9:53 am | by Laura Mgrdichian | News | CommentsScientists working at NSLS are investigating a material that may lead to greatly improved tires for cars and other vehicles. Their study is an example of how incorporating nanoparticles into a regular substance can produce a material with superior properties—in this case, increased durability and heat resistance.
New results from LHC highlight densest-ever matter
May 23, 2011 7:33 am | News | CommentsThe three LHC experiments that study lead ion collisions all presented their latest results today at the annual Quark Matter conference, held this year in Annecy, France. Among the concrete discoveries is the finding that matter created in lead ion collisions is the densest ever observed, over 100,000 times hotter than the interior of the sun and denser than neutron stars.
