New composite may be key to improved hydrogen storage
Aug. 10, 2023-
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) computational scientists worked with experimental collaborators at Lawrence Berkeley and Sandia national laboratories to design metal amide-based composites capable of overcoming key kinetic limitations in their performance as hydrogen storage materials.
Hydrogen possesses the highest energy density of any chemical fuel and can be...
Explainable artificial intelligence can enhance scientific workflows
Aug. 1, 2023-
Machine learning techniques are increasingly being used in the sciences, as they can streamline work and improve efficiency. But these techniques are sometimes met with hesitation: When users don’t understand what’s going on behind the curtains, they may lack trust in the machine learning models.
As these tools become more widespread, a team of researchers in Lawrence Livermore...
Machine learning reveals refreshing understanding of confined water
July 24, 2023-
A new study provides surprising behavior of hydrogen bonding of water confined in carbon nanotubes.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists combined large-scale molecular dynamics simulations with machine learning interatomic potentials derived from first-principles calculations to examine the hydrogen bonding of water confined in carbon nanotubes (CNTs). They found that...
Greenland melted recently, shows high risk of sea level rise today
July 20, 2023-
A large portion of Greenland was an ice-free tundra landscape — perhaps covered by trees and roaming wooly mammoths — in the recent geologic past (about 416,000 years ago), according to a new study in the journal Science.
The results shed light on the stability of the Greenland ice sheet, which was long assumed to have been frozen continuously over the last two and a half million years...
Sterile neutrino research ramps up
June 26, 2023-
An international collaboration of researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and other scientific institutions is ramping up its studies into “sterile neutrinos” to discover and better understand dark matter.
Sterile neutrinos are theoretically predicted new particles that offer an intriguing possibility in the quest for understanding the dark matter in our universe. ...
Human-caused climate change at the center of recent California wildfires
June 12, 2023-
Summer wildfire seasons in California routinely break records. The average summer burn area in forests in northern and central portions of the state have increased fivefold between 1996 and 2021 compared to between 1971 and 1995.
Although the drivers of increased temperature and dryness are known, the contribution of human-caused climate change to wildfire activity, relative to natural...
Research reveals how humidity affects atmospheric corrosion of aluminum metal
June 6, 2023-
Scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) performed simulations using the Lab's supercomputer Ruby to uncover physical mechanisms that explain why humidity controls the rate of atmospheric corrosion of aluminum metal. Their research is featured in the ACS Journal of Applied Materials and Interfaces.
Accurate predictions of aluminum component lifetimes depend on...
Cover cropping can increase farming yields
June 1, 2023-
Cropland management practices that restore soil organic carbon (SOC) are often looked at as climate solutions that also enhance yields. But how often these benefits align at the farm level — the scale of farmers’ decision-making — remains unclear.
In a new study in Nature Sustainability, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientist and collaborators examined concurrent SOC...
New report finds that carbon capture and storage in California can concurrently serve local communities, the environment and the economy
May 24, 2023-
A new report co-authored by George Peridas of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Benjamin Grove of the Clean Air Task Force examines the economic viability of carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects in California and finds that several classes of projects are viable today.
These can help the state meet its climate goals and hold a sizable potential to benefit host...
Lab researchers assist for new Compact X-ray FEL
May 22, 2023-
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and University of California, Davis researchers are assisting Arizona State University with a new laser facility that will use ultrafast pulsed X-ray beams to study biological processes, materials and other research at the atomic level.
In March, the National Science Foundation announced that it was awarding $90.8 million to Tempe...
Clear human influence on atmospheric temperature changes
May 16, 2023-
New research shows that it is now virtually impossible for natural causes to explain satellite-measured changes in the thermal structure of Earth’s atmosphere.
The analysis conducted by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and colleagues for the first time demonstrates that extending “fingerprinting” techniques — used to identify the human effects on climate — to...
A rock hard technique to harvest atmospheric CO2
May 9, 2023-
Carbonate minerals are formed when carbon dioxide reacts with magnesium and calcium-rich rocks. But where does that CO2 come from?
If it comes from the atmosphere, this process at sufficient scale may be able to reliably draw down atmospheric greenhouse gas levels, according to new research by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists. The research appears in the journal Nuc...
Long-term coastal cliff loss due to climate change
May 2, 2023-
The dangers of coastal erosion are an all-too-familiar reality for the modern residents of California’s iconic mountainous coastal communities. With a new tool, researchers are now bringing historical perspective to the topic of how to manage these disappearing coastlines.
Using a model that incorporates measurements of the amount of time coastal cliffs and their remnant deposits were...
LLNL celebrates National Physics Day
April 24, 2023-
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is celebrating National Physics Day (April 24) by highlighting just a few of the thousands of physicists that work at the Lab. Physics is a scientific practice that seeks to understand the way the universe behaves by examining properties of matter and energy.
Representing a cross-section of the broad scope of focus areas and disciplines...
Fueling up hydrogen production
April 3, 2023-
Through machine learning, a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientist has a better grasp of understanding materials used to produce hydrogen fuel.
Water is everywhere in the environment and its interaction with metal oxide surfaces has a key role in processes that range from wetting, dissolution and corrosion to photocatalytic reactions. The relative stability of molecular vs...
LLNL scientists develop model for more efficient simulations of protein interactions linked to cancer
March 28, 2023-
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists have developed a theoretical model for more efficient molecular-level simulations of cell membranes and their lipid-protein interactions, part of a multi-institutional effort to better understand the behavior of cancer-causing membrane proteins.
Developed under an ongoing collaboration by the Department of Energy (DOE) and the National...
LLNL’s William Evans to serve on Fannie and John Hertz Foundation board of directors
March 20, 2023-
Lab physicist William Evans has been selected to serve on the board of directors for the Fannie and John Hertz Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering the most promising innovators in science and technology.
Evans is the physics division leader in the Physical and Life Sciences Directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), which works to enable U.S...
Prototype telescope designed by Lawrence Livermore researchers launched to the International Space Station
March 16, 2023-
A prototype telescope designed and built by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) researchers has been launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., to the International Space Station (ISS).
Known as the Stellar Occultation Hypertemporal Imaging Payload (SOHIP), the telescope uses LLNL patented-monolithic optics technology on a gimbal to observe and measure atmospheric gravity waves and...
Breaking it down, carbon nanotube style
March 14, 2023-
When it comes to studying particles in motion, experimentalists have followed a 100-year-old theory that claims the microscopic motion of a particle is determined by random collisions with molecules of the surrounding medium, regardless of the macroscopic forces that drive that motion.
Scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...
Demonstrating energy-efficient conversion of nitrate pollutants into ammonia
March 13, 2023-
The nitrate runoff problem, a source of carcinogens and a cause of suffocating algal blooms in U.S. waterways, may not be a harbinger of doom.
A new study led by the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) demonstrates an approach for the integrated capture and conversion of nitrate-contaminated waters into valuable ammonia...
