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Temperature is represented by different colors for this heat sink for a 50-kilowatt DC-to-DC converter with red being the hottest.

Production run spot checks of materials for lithium-ion batteries and fuel cells could be a thing of the past because of a process developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The infrared/thermal nondestructive evaluation technique invented by a team led by David Wood examines key parameters such as porosity and thickness of the coating in real time without destroying product.

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Since the discovery of high-temperature superconductors — materials that can transport electricity with perfect efficiency at or near liquid nitrogen temperatures (minus-196 degrees Celsius) — scientists have been working to develop a theory that explains their essential physics.
Cistern Spring in Yellowstone National Park is home to the elusive archaeon Nanopusillus acidilobi.
A microbial partnership thriving in an acidic hot spring in Yellowstone National Park has surrendered some of its lifestyle secrets to researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Mircea Podar of ORNL’s Biosciences Division led a team t...
Earth system models simulate Northern Hemisphere greening.
A multinational team led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory Climate Change Science Institute has found the first positive correlation between human activity and enhanced vegetation growth. The research team, led by Jiafu Mao of the Ecosys...
In conventional, low-temperature superconductivity (left), so-called Cooper pairing arises from the presence of an electron Fermi sea. In the pseudogap regime of the cuprate superconductors (right), parts of the Fermi sea are “dried out” and the charge-ca
When physicists Georg Bednorz and K. Alex Muller discovered the first high-temperature superconductors in 1986, it didn’t take much imagination to envision the potential technological benefits of harnessing such materials.
Fernanda Foertter
Fernanda Foertter, a user support specialist at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, considers herself a tinkerer. Foertter’s tinkering started when she was a child, but her innate inquisitiveness still influences her work at the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing...
An illustration of the dopamine transporter in its outward- (left) and inward-opening (right) state. Note that the inward opening has brought about an outward closing and change in the number of water molecules (blue, pink spheres) inside and outside the

In an era of instant communication, perhaps no message-passing system is more underappreciated than the human body. Underlying each movement, each mood, each sight, sound, or smell, an army of specialized cells called neurons relays signals that register in the brain and connect us to our environment.

Gas bubbles are released from a saturated part of the Barrow Environmental Observatory.
A new study published in Nature Climate Change indicates soil moisture levels will determine how much carbon is released to the atmosphere as rising temperatures thaw Arctic lands.
Baohua Gu

Baohua Gu, a distinguished senior scientist in the Environmental Sciences Division of the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been elected a fellow of the Geological Society of America (GSA). 

Future Formula E cars could be powered by batteries that feature up to 30 percent increased energy density.

Drivers of Formula E cars may soon no longer have to change cars midway through the race, thanks to a battery coating technology developed by XALT Energy of Michigan and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. By depositing a nanoscale layer of alumina on oxide cathodes, researchers have incre...