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Media Contacts
![Costas Tsouris portrait](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-12/2019-P16550_0.jpg?h=036a71b7&itok=0wysIPxo)
While Tsouris’ water research is diverse in scope, its fundamentals are based on basic science principles that remain largely unchanged, particularly in a mature field like chemical engineering.
![Water and energy are inextricably linked, yet in our 20th-century water systems we use freshwater once then throw it away. With innovations designed to enhance desalination technologies, agricultural runoff, produced water from industry, and inland brackish groundwater that are now seen as untreatable could all be sources of clean, safe, and affordable water.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-09/thumb_nawi.jpg?h=f7696e41&itok=hnr0jkMY)
The National Alliance for Water Innovation, a partnership of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, other national labs, university and private sector partners, has been awarded a five-year, $100 million Energy-Water Desalination Hub by DOE to address water security issues in the United States.
![Desalination process](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-07/hydrophopicDesal04_0.jpg?h=5473d993&itok=bUBkpGOa)
A new method developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory improves the energy efficiency of a desalination process known as solar-thermal evaporation.
![Alex Johs at ORNL's Spallation Neutron Source](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-06/2019-p01807.jpg?h=f8570409&itok=KBUOueeI)
Sometimes solutions to the biggest problems can be found in the smallest details. The work of biochemist Alex Johs at Oak Ridge National Laboratory bears this out, as he focuses on understanding protein structures and molecular interactions to resolve complex global problems like the spread of mercury pollution in waterways and the food supply.
![ORNL collaborator Hsiu-Wen Wang led the neutron scattering experiments at the Spallation Neutron Source to probe complex electrolyte solutions that challenge nuclear waste processing at Hanford and other sites. Credit: Genevieve Martin/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Dept. of Energy.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-05/2019-P01240_0.jpg?h=c6980913&itok=RLLi1M-g)
Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and Washington State University teamed up to investigate the complex dynamics of low-water liquids that challenge nuclear waste processing at federal cleanup sites.
![Desalination diagram](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2019-04/DesalDiagram-_0.jpg?h=d4f5ec8a&itok=-yhECJ4V)
A team of scientists led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory used carbon nanotubes to improve a desalination process that attracts and removes ionic compounds such as salt from water using charged electrodes.
![At the salt–metal interface, thermodynamic forces drive chromium from the bulk of a nickel alloy, leaving a porous, weakened layer. Impurities in the salt drive further corrosion of the structural material. Credit: Stephen Raiman/Oak Ridge National Labora At the salt–metal interface, thermodynamic forces drive chromium from the bulk of a nickel alloy, leaving a porous, weakened layer. Impurities in the salt drive further corrosion of the structural material. Credit: Stephen Raiman/Oak Ridge National Labora](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/story%20tip%20image%20BW%20only.jpg?itok=Vbc0iTLt)
Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists analyzed more than 50 years of data showing puzzlingly inconsistent trends about corrosion of structural alloys in molten salts and found one factor mattered most—salt purity.
![exp_in_10_dry_tube.jpg exp_in_10_dry_tube.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/exp_in_10_dry_tube.jpg?itok=cmBuu2CQ)
Scientists from Oak Ridge National Laboratory performed a corrosion test in a neutron radiation field to support the continued development of molten salt reactors.
![Methanogen_mercury_study3.jpg Methanogen_mercury_study3.jpg](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/Methanogen_mercury_study3.jpg?itok=a79hsOOv)
Biologists from Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center have confirmed that microorganisms called methanogens can transform mercury into the neurotoxin methylmercury with varying efficiency across species.
![ORNL is again hosting a workshop focused on the next generation of molten salt reactors. ORNL is again hosting a workshop focused on the next generation of molten salt reactors.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/news/images/05%20-%20NUCLEAR_Molten_Salt_Reactor_Workshop.jpg?itok=5mV4FIMW)
Experts focused on the future of nuclear technology will gather at Oak Ridge National Laboratory for the fourth annual Molten Salt Reactor Workshop on October 3–4.