News Releases

A global team of researchers set a new benchmark for future experiments making materials in space rather than for space. The team included members from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge and Argonne national laboratories, Materials Development, Inc., NASA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, ISIS Neutron and Muon Source, Alfred University and the University of New Mexico. Together, they discovered that many kinds of glass, including ones that could be developed for next-generation optical devices, have similar atomic structure and arrangements and can successfully be made in space.

Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are developing battery technologies to fight climate change in two ways, by expanding the use of renewable energy and capturing airborne carbon dioxide. ORNL researchers recently created and tested two different formulations for batteries that store renewable energy; when the energy is later used, an electrochemical reaction converts industrial carbon dioxide emissions into a solid form that has the potential to be used in other products.

A team led by researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory explored training strategies for one of the largest artificial intelligence models to date with help from Frontier, the world’s fastest supercomputer.The findings could help guide training for a new generation of AI models for scientific research.

Local decision-makers looking for ways to reduce the impact of heat waves on their communities have a valuable new capability at their disposal: a new study on vegetation resilience. Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory completed a study of how well vegetation survived extreme heat events in both urban and rural communities across the country in recent years. The analysis informs pathways for climate mitigation, including ways to reduce the effect of urban heat islands.

A collection of seven technologies for lithium recovery developed by scientists from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been licensed to Element3, a Texas-based company focused on extracting lithium from wastewater produced by oil and gas production. 

Research led by scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has demonstrated that small changes in the isotopic content of thin semiconductor materials can influence their optical and electronic properties, possibly opening the way to new and advanced designs with the semiconductors.

Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed lubricant additives that protect both water turbine equipment and the surrounding environment.

Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and six other Department of Energy national laboratories have developed a United States-based perspective for achieving net-zero carbon emissions. The roadmap was recently published in the journal Nature Reviews Chemistry.

Scott Curran, group leader for Fuel Science and Engine Technologies Research at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been named a Fellow of SAE International and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, or ASME. 

New research predicts peak groundwater extraction for key basins around the globe by the year 2050. The map indicates groundwater storage trends for Earth’s 37 largest aquifers using data from the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory GRACE satellite.