BiotechMashup

Physicists have determined that the interactions of light and matter with spacetime, as predicted by general relativity, can be studied using the new breed of artificial optical materials that feature extraordinary abilities to bend light and other forms of electromagnetic radiation.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) In an attempt to explain away invisible dark matter and dark energy, some theorists have offered modified theories of gravity that try to improve on Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. A new study based on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and inspired by the work of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory cosmologist Uros Seljak indicates that at least one of these alternate theories is wrong.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of Californuia at Berkeley have learned to control the quantum pathways that determine how light scatters in graphene. A sheet of carbon just a single atom thick, graphene's extraordinary crystalline structure gives rise to unique electronic and optical properties. Controlling light scattering not only provides a new tool for studying graphene but points to practical applications for managing light and electronic states in graphene nanodevices.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) A technique for testing irradiated materials on the nanoscale that yields results on the macroscale has been developed by scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the University of California at Berkeley, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. The technique uses electron microscopy with mechanical testing in situ; it could accelerate new materials for nuclear power applications and improve testing of nuclear power plants already in service.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Warm dense matter exists in the cores of gas giant planets and the preliminary stages of nuclear fusion, among other inaccessible places. With an accelerator being built at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory as part of the Heavy Ion Fusion Science Virtual National Laboratory, a collaboration among Berkeley Lab, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, scientists will soon be able to study warm dense matter in the laboratory.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) In a three-pronged attack on one of the stubbornest problems in materials sciences, groups from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, with colleagues from the University of California at Berkeley and Stanford University, have produced the strongest evidence yet that the mysterious pseudogap, hallmark of high-temperature superconductors, is not a gradual transition to the superconducting phase as long supposed, but instead is a unique and hitherto unknown phase of matter.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the University of California at Berkeley, Stanford University, and their colleagues have used new techniques to confirm the existence of long-predicted edge states in graphene nanoribbons, opening new prospects for characterizing and controlling the electronic, spintronic, magnetic, and optical properties of nanoscale devices.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Alkali-vapor magnetometers use light to put a spin on atoms and then measure that spin to detect magnetic fields. A team from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the University of California at Berkeley, and the Vavilov State Optical Institute in Russia have achieved a remarkable technical advance with this kind of magnetometer, with potential for improving atomic clocks, quantum memory devices, and a range of other scientific gadgets that depend on measuring spinning atoms with light.

(DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) Scientists from the US Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have teamed up with students from the University of California (UC), Berkeley to run a series of efficiency tests comparing the traditional Haiti cookstove with a variety of low-cost, commercially available alternatives. The long-term goal is to find the safest and most fuel-efficient stove -- or to design a new one that would win favor with the cooks of Haiti.