Tag Archive for Molecular Foundry

Engineering Bacterial Live Wires

febrero 28, 2013 Ciencia, Feature Stories, materials sciences, Science
Just like electronics, living cells use electrons for energy and information transfer. Despite electrons being a common “language” of the living and electronic worlds, living cells cannot speak to our largely technological realm. Giving a cell the ability to communicate directly with an electrode would lead to enormous opportunities in the development of new energy conversion techniques, fuel production, biological reporters, or new forms of bioelectronic systems. Building off previous research, a group led by Berkeley Lab's Caroline Ajo-Franklin has now demonstrated that engineered E. coli strains can generate measurable current at an anode.
No comments

Black Gold: Enabling Bright, High Rep-Rate Electron Beams

febrero 14, 2013 Ciencia, physics, Science
Free electron lasers (FELs) have proven their worth, but next-generation light sources will have to do better than produce ultrabright x-ray pulses 100 or so times a second. What’s needed is megahertz rep rate, a million times a second. Since it’s electrons that make the x-rays, the only way to achieve that kind of performance [...]
No comments , , , ,

Seeing in Color at the Nanoscale

diciembre 6, 2012 Ciencia, Feature Stories, materials sciences, nanoscience, Science, Top Story
If nanoscience were television, we’d be in the 1950s. Although scientists can make and manipulate nanoscale objects with increasingly awesome control, they are limited to black-and-white imagery for examining those objects. Information about nanoscale chemistry and interactions with light—the atomic-microscopy equivalent to color—is tantalizingly out of reach to all but the most persistent researchers. But that may all change with the introduction of a new microscopy tool from researchers at Berkeley Lab that delivers exquisite chemical details with a resolution once thought impossible.
No comments

Innovation on the Cutting-Edge: Advancing Energy Efficiency Through Two New ARPA-E Projects at Berkeley Lab

diciembre 3, 2012 awards, Ciencia, energy efficiency, News Releases, Science
Two Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) research projects were awarded grants by the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) to advance energy technologies. The two grants total nearly $5 million. The first grant of $3 million went to the Molecular Foundry’s Delia Milliron for her work on smart window technologies. The project will [...]
No comments , ,

Folding Funnels Key to Biomimicry

octubre 30, 2012 Biology, Ciencia, Feature Stories, materials sciences, nanoscience, Science, Top Story
Berkeley Lab researchers have shown that a concept widely accepted as describing the folding of a single individual protein is also applicable to the self-assembly of multiple proteins. Their findings provide important guidelines for future biomimicry efforts, particularly for device fabrication and nanoscale synthesis.
No comments

Forcing the Molecular Bond Issue:

septiembre 5, 2012 chemistry, Ciencia, energy, Feature Stories, materials sciences, Science, Top Story
Researchers at Berkeley Lab’s Molecular Foundry developed a first-of-its-kind model for providing a comprehensive description of the way in which molecular bonds form and rupture. This model enables researchers to predict the “binding free energy” of a given molecular system, a key to predicting how that molecule will interact with other molecules.
No comments ,

Form, Function and Folding: In collaboration with Berkeley Lab, a team of scientists move toward rational design of artificial proteins

agosto 21, 2012 Ciencia, materials sciences, nanoscience, News Releases, Science
In the world of proteins, form defines function. Based on interactions between their constituent amino acids, proteins form specific conformations, folding and twisting into distinct, chemically directed shapes. The resulting structure dictates the proteins’ actions; thus accurate modeling of structure is vital to understanding functionality. Peptoids, the synthetic cousins of proteins, follow similar design rules. Less [...]
No comments

First Direct Observation of Oriented Attachment in Nanocrystal Growth

mayo 24, 2012 Ciencia, energy, materials sciences, nanoscience, News Releases, Science, Top Story
Berkeley Lab researchers have reported the first direct observation of nanoparticles undergoing oriented attachment, the critical step in biomineralization and the growth of nanocrystals. A better understanding of oriented attachment in nanoparticles is a key to synthesizing new materials with remarkable structural properties.
No comments , ,