05
Jan2015
Sometimes the ordinary things we use every day can lead to extraordinary discoveries. This was truly the case when physicists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov used the humble adhesive tape to extract single layers of graphene from graphite.
Although graphene had been theorized years before, it was thought to be impossible to isolate such thin crystalline materials in a laboratory. Geim and Novoselov not only exfoliated their thin sheets of graphene, they transferred them to a silicon substrate, the standard working material in the semiconductor industry and did electrical characterization on the graphite layers.
15
Dec2014
I’ve always been a “window shopper.” I don’t want to go in and find the store directory, follow the little map, go up the escalator and through the racks…unless the window displays tell me it will probably be worth my time. I tend to approach databases the same way; I want to know what’s in there. Not only do I want some reassurance that what I need is there, but I also want to see if there’s information I may not have realized I need yet.
19
Nov2014
Every summer for the past 16 years, the Department of Energy has invited the best and brightest graduates from across the country to attend the National School on Neutron and X-ray Scattering (NXS). This year, 65 graduate students attending North American universities, and studying physics, chemistry, materials science, or related fields, participated in the 14-day whirlwind emersion into national user facilities to learn in a hands-on environment how to use neutrons and X-rays in their research. This educational program is jointly conducted by Argonne National Laboratory's Advanced Photon Source and Materials Science Division and Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Neutron Scattering Science Division.
29
Oct2014
Earth system modeling as we know it and how it benefits climate change research is about to transform with the newly launched Accelerated Climate Modeling for Energy (ACME) project sponsored by the Earth System Modeling program within the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Biological and Environmental Research. ACME is an unprecedented collaboration among eight national laboratories, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, four academic institutions, and one private-sector company to develop and apply the most complete, leading-edge climate and earth system models to the most challenging and demanding climate-change issues.
09
Oct2014
The Department of Energy (DOE) recently completed two significant declassification efforts and has made the newly released documents publicly available on the OpenNet database, which DOE launched 20 years ago to improve public access to declassified documents. The website is supported by the DOE Office of Classification and hosted by the Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) on a cost-reimbursable basis.
Over a 12-month period concluding in July 2014, DOE released to the public the Manhattan District History, a multi-volume classified history of the Manhattan Project.
