Science Highlights

Highlight Archive: 2010 | 09 | 08 | 07 | 06 | 05 | 04 | 03 | 02 | 01

Making Thin Films Stable through Phase-Changing
In an effort to produce ever-smaller electronics, a team of researchers has used the NSLS to show that slightly changing the way a material is formed can drastically alter its properties. Their findings could help modify the characteristics of silicides, an important class of thin films – layers of material on the order of a millionth of a meter thick – that are crucial to creating the electrical circuits that make devices like handheld computers, cell phones, and digital music players work.

Switchable Nanostructures Made with DNA
Scientists at Brookhaven National Laboratory have found a new way to use a synthetic form of DNA to control the assembly of nanoparticles — this time resulting in switchable, three-dimensional and small-cluster structures that might be useful, for example, as biosensors, in solar cells, and as new materials for data storage. The work is described in Nature Nanotechnology, published online December 20, 2009.

Researchers Solve Structure of Receptor that could be Drug Target for Neurological Diseases
A team of scientists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) has reported their success in solving the molecular structure of a key portion of a cellular receptor implicated in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and other serious illnesses. Assistant Professor Hiro Furukawa and colleagues at CSHL, in cooperation with the NSLS, obtained crystal structures for one of several "subunits" of the NMDA receptor. This receptor, formally called the N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor, belongs to a family of cellular receptors that mediate excitatory nerve transmission in the brain.

Linking Lava and "Rust" to the Earth's Evolution
By examining microscopic crystals that once lived deep in the Earth, a team of scientists is chipping away at a big story – one that tells the details of the planet's evolution. This research, conducted by University of Rhode Island researcher Katherine Kelley and Smithsonian Institution geologist Elizabeth Cottrell, helps explain why the Earth's mantle is more oxidized at subduction zones – areas of the ocean floor where tectonic plates merge – than at mid-ocean ridges, where the plates spread apart.

Tapering a Free-Electron Laser to Extract More Juice
Researchers from the NSLS and Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) have demonstrated a technique that could be used to significantly improve the quantity and quality of light produced from a free-electron laser (FEL) – a source that provides pulses of light that can be 1,000 times shorter than those at conventional storage ring light sources. The research, conducted at the NSLS Source Development Laboratory (SDL), is the first to show an efficiency and spectrum enhancement in the FEL by tapering the device's undulator, the array of magnets that induces the electron beam to generate radiation. The results are published in the October 7, 2009, edition of Physical Review Letters.

Metal Deficiency in Mouse Brain Plaques Guides Direction of Human Alzheimer's Disease Research
Minuscule plaques in the brains of mice with Alzheimer's disease contain much less metal than the brains of affected humans, according to a study conducted at the NSLS. This surprising finding could help researchers pinpoint the effect of metal in the human disease, and, in the long term, lead to targets for drug development or prevention methods.

Breaking Down the Barrier for Smaller, Faster Electronic Devices
A team of international researchers is the first to uncover the chemical composition and structure of a microelectronics element that is vital to producing ever smaller – and, thus, cheaper and faster – devices. "The number of electronic devices that can be placed within an integrated circuit has followed almost perfectly an exponential increase in the past 40 years," said James Ablett, a researcher at Synchrotron SOLEIL in France. "However, to maintain this rate, a major change in the fabrication process is required."

Inhibitors of Important Tuberculosis Survival Mechanism Identified
Attempts to eradicate tuberculosis (TB) are stymied by the fact that the disease-causing bacteria have a sophisticated mechanism for surviving dormant in infected cells. Now, a team of scientists including researchers from the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, Stony Brook University (SBU), Weill Cornell Medical College, and The Rockefeller University has identified compounds that inhibit that mechanism — without damaging human cells. The results, described in the September 16, 2009, issue of Nature, include structural studies of how the inhibitor molecules interact with bacterial proteins, and could lead to the design of new anti-TB drugs.