Research
Highlights...
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Number 267 |
August 11, 2008 |
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Expanding the radiotracer tool kit
Using positron emission tomography (PET) to monitor the movement and interactions of radioactively labeled “tracer” compounds inside the human body, scientists have advanced the understanding of diseases such as cancer and drug addiction. But there are many more compounds scientists would like to label for tracking with PET. To this end, researchers at DOE’s Brookhaven Lab have devised a simple, fast method for radiolabeling formaldehyde, a common organic chemical reagent. This radiolabeled formaldehyde can now be used to synthesize a wide range of carbon-chain molecules that can be administered to humans as radiotracers, greatly expanding the tool kit available to PET researchers.
[Karen McNulty Walsh, 631/344-8350,
kmcnulty@bnl.gov] |
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Kinetic battery truly off the grid
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M2E Motion-to-Energy Power Generation Systems |
Inventors at DOE's Idaho National Laboratory have collaborated with research partners at M2E Power, Inc., to successfully convert the power of motion into electrical generation and battery charging. This sophisticated technology, M2E motion-to-energy power generation systems, uses an innovative, optimized microgenerator with power management circuitry that kinetically charges mobile batteries from natural motion, such as walking. This breakthrough technology eliminates the need for recharging — taking mobile devices off the electrical grid. This changes the very nature of mobile power. No longer will people need to plug in to get the power needed for smart phones, digital cameras, gaming devices or mobile audio players.
[Keith Arterburn, 208/526-4845,
keith.arterburn@inl.gov] |
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Argonne bottle cap thwarts wine counterfeiters
In the past few decades, bottles of rare premium wines have begun to command tens of thousands of dollars apiece at auction, and thousands of other wines retail for hundreds to thousands of dollars a bottle. Although there may be no match for quality of the product inside, the ease and accuracy with which fraudsters can pass off bottles of "two-buck chuck" with ritzy labels have allowed wine counterfeiting to grow into a booming criminal enterprise. To combat this problem, engineer Roger Johnston and his colleagues in the Vulnerability Assessment Team at DOE's Argonne National Laboratory have created a cap that fits over the bottle's cork. The cap contains a small circuit that completes when it is removed, which triggers an electric pulse that creates electronic evidence someone has tampered with the bottle. By connecting the cap to a laptop through a USB cable, the auctioneer or the consumer can check whether or not the wine has already been opened or altered. Each cap has a unique bottle number that is registered to the winemaker, preventing wine counterfeiters from putting the Argonne caps on their fake Bordeaux and Burgundies.
[Jared Sagoff, 630/252-5549,
jsagoff@anl.gov] |
Fermilab zooms in on the Higgs particle
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Higgs Mass Exclusion |
Scientists working on the CDF and DZero experiments at DOE’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory have entered Higgs territory. For the first time, the two experiments directly restrict the allowed mass range for the elusive Higgs particle, which would explain why elementary particles such as electrons and quarks have mass. Prior to this result, particle physicists expected the Higgs to have a mass in the range of 114 to about 200 GeV/c2. Now, CDF and DZero scientists have ruled out a Higgs mass of 170 GeV/c2. The two groups expect to double their data sets in the next couple of years, improving their chance to observe the particle or to constrain its mass even further.
[Kurt Riesselmann, 630/840-5681,
kurtr@fnal.gov] |
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NREL's Michael Crowley helps researchers see nature at work
Its official name is cellobiohydrolase Cel7A. In Michael Crowley's award-winning animated version, it looks a Technicolor dinosaur fossil caught in the act of chomping on dinner.
In reality, Cel7A is just the opposite—it's a vegetarian molecule.
Crowley, a senior scientist, and his associates at DOE's National Renewable Energy Laboratory are modeling nature's primary agent for decaying plants. By precisely understanding how Cel7A does its job so well, they hope to bioengineer a version that will accelerate the process of making ethanol from woody plants and farm wastes.
Crowley's animation was awarded second place in DOE's Electronic Visualization competition sponsored by the Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing program. He received the award at the program's meeting in Seattle. It was Crowley's first submission.
What makes the award especially noteworthy is the nature of the competition.
His animation was one of 52 submissions by national laboratories and universities. Moreover, nearly all of the contestants were visualizing the behavior of large-scale phenomenon like hurricanes and flames.
Instead, Crowley's work focuses on the behavior of a single molecule. While something like a storm can be very large and complex, the process of modeling them is relatively straightforward and can be divided into discrete sections and a logical sequence.
In contrast, Crowley said, animating Cel7A required finding ways to successfully model the interactivity of many atoms interacting dynamically with each other—simultaneously.
"It is very difficult to parallelize the process to run even on a huge computer," Crowley said. "You can have 1,000 processors and it's not easy to speed up."
Crowley is a native of Hempstead, Long Island. He studied chemistry as an undergraduate at Fordham University and received a Ph.D. from the University of Montana. Prior to joining NREL 16 months ago, he was at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., where he studied protein folding in human metabolism and helped develop high performance computer programming. He joined NREL and started his own high performance computer group after consulting with the Lab's biofuels program.
To Crowley, the issue is still metabolism. But instead of human proteins and food, he is investigating an enzyme found in fungi and the guts of termites that breaks down the tough complex carbohydrates in cellulose and turns them into a simpler form of sugar.
In nature, that sugar is food for the termite or other organisms. At NREL, it becomes the materials that are more easily refined into biofuels.
Submitted by DOE's National Renewable Energy Laboratory
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