The project takes advantage of one of the most comprehensive collections of breast cancer clinical samples in the U.S. — the Clinical Breast Care Project located at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., and the Windber Research Institute in Winder, Pa.

Researchers will explore these samples using advanced proteomics technology at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory in Richland, Wash. Led by PNNL proteomics researcher Richard D. Smith, the study is funded by the Department of Defense.

"Triple negative cancers are more likely to hit young women and African American women. That's a health disparity issue. We need a better understanding of this disease," said team member Karin Rodland, a cancer biologist at PNNL. "And what's been holding that up has been getting enough samples to thoroughly examine how triple negative cancers operate."

Because the Army has such a large population of women that receive health care for years, as well as a higher percentage of black women than the general U.S. population, the Walter Reed-Windber breast cancer repository will provide many high quality samples with well-documented health histories.

One of the first things doctors check when a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer is whether her cancer will grow in response to any or all of three hormones: one that stimulates cell growth and two sex hormones, estrogen or progesterone — cancers that can be treated with particular drugs. But many other breast cancers don't respond. Called triple negative breast cancers, these types represent a wide variety of cancers and are typically more aggressive and harder to treat.

The research team will profile the complement of proteins — known as the proteome — that the breast cancer tissues produce, looking for proteins that triple negative cancers share. The shared proteins could suggest new options for drug therapies. In addition, comparing how aggressive the cancers are to the complement of proteins the cancers make or other metabolic products could lead to new diagnostic tools.

In addition to finding leads on diagnostic tools and therapies, the study might reveal proteins and molecular pathways that have gone astray and led to the cancer in the first place.

A recent, unrelated study reported in the news from the journal Nature re-grouped breast cancers into 10 sub-groups based on the cancer's genes and which genes were turned on or off in the cancerous cells. But genes are like a raw movie script — how the movie turns out depends on many details beyond the words in the script. This new study will look beyond genes to see how cancer cells translated their scripts into live action.

The PNNL research effort will draw on the unique instruments and expertise developed at PNNL and EMSL in support of DOE-funded research in biofuels and bioremediation, which are also applicable to biological questions related to human health.

Payne will use the grant to develop algorithms to find specific patterns in the large amount of data generated by scientific instruments called mass spectrometers. The patterns Payne is looking for help identify proteins in complex samples of bacteria.  He will use the grant to focus on bacterial communities that help cows digest plants. Better understanding how bacteria use proteins to degrade plants can improve biofuel production.

Payne is among 68 researchers who were selected this year from a pool of about 850 proposals.

The Early Career Research Program is designed to bolster the nation's scientific workforce by providing support to exceptional researchers during the crucial early years, when many scientists do their most formative work. The program is funded by DOE's Office of Science.
 
To be eligible for an award, a researcher must have earned a doctorate within the past 10 years and be an untenured, tenure-track assistant or associate professor at a U.S. academic institution or a full-time employee at a DOE national laboratory.
 
For more information about the program and the research it supports, go to the Early Career Research Program website.

The FLC's Interagency Partnership Award annually recognizes employees from at least two different federal agencies or laboratories who have "collaboratively accomplished outstanding work in transferring a technology." The IPA acknowledges the collaborative relationship among the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock Division, Ship Systems Engineering Station and the U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command.

The Navy continually seeks technology to improve processes and conditions for the thousands of sailors serving onboard its current fleet of submarines.  This approach is an entirely new application developed to cleanse breathing air in the confined space of a submarine.  The system demonstrated that it can replace a bulky, heavy, corrosive and malodorous liquid process that produces a significant organic solvent waste stream used for more than half of a century by the U.S. Navy and navies of many other countries.

"This is a new application of a technology that was previously developed by PNNL to remove heavy metal contamination from ground and surface waters found at many DOE waste sites," said PNNL Material Scientist Glen Fryxell, one of the key PNNL inventors of the SAMMS technology.  The SAMMS materials can absorb large quantities of liquid and airborne contaminants without creating secondary waste, and is disposable as nonhazardous waste. 

The SAMMS technology is based on a new class of hybrid nanoporous materials that can rapidly capture contaminants such as carbon dioxide, mercury or arsenic directly from the atmosphere or liquid environments.  For air rejuvenation systems, SAMMS can provide a controlled release of the carbon dioxide using a gentle application of heat or vacuum.

"The technology could open doors to other large scale or small scale air quality treatments," said Fryxell.  Researchers believe the air-cleansing system might be used in underwater rebreather SCUBA gear, in space-based vehicles or in spacesuit air rejuvenation systems. SAMMS carbon dioxide removal also has potential in minimizing heating and cooling costs in buildings by reducing outdoor air exchange.

PNNL, NSWCCD-SSES and NAVSEA will receive the 2012 FLC Interagency Partnership Award at a ceremony, May 3, 2012, at the FLC National Meeting in Pittsburgh, Pa.

The FLC is a nationwide network of federal laboratories that provides a forum to develop strategies and opportunities to link the laboratories' missions and expertise with the marketplace. The FLC was organized in 1974 and formally chartered by the Federal Technology Transfer Act of 1986 to promote and strengthen technology transfer nationwide. More than 250 federal laboratories and centers and their parent departments and agencies are FLC members.

Since 1984, when the FLC awards program was established, PNNL has earned 74 of the awards, far more than any other national laboratory. This is PNNL's first FLC IPA award, however.

The 3rd International Conference on Nuclear Power Plant Life Management (PLiM) for Long Term Operations will be held May 13-17, 2012 at the Hilton Salt Lake City Center. The conference is organized by the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, and is hosted by the U.S. government through its Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Department of Energy. DOE's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is organizing the conference on behalf of the NRC and DOE.

Keynote and plenary speakers include NRC Commissioner George Apostolakis, IAEA Deputy Director General Alexander Bychkov, Idaho Governor Butch Otter and director of the Idaho National Laboratory, John Grossenbacher. A tour of the nearby 900-square mile Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls will follow the conference.  Additional details on the conference, including an agenda, can be found at the conference website.

Currently, there are nearly 440 operating commercial nuclear power reactors in 31 countries, providing about 14 percent of the world's electricity. Another 63 plants — including 26 in China, and five in the U.S. — are under construction. In the United States, 104 plants provide about 19 percent of the nation's electricity. Most U.S. plants were constructed in the 1960s and 1970s, and to date 71 U.S. plants have received license extensions to operate for 60 years while the remainder are expected to request 20-year license extensions.  Further, the U.S. nuclear industry is considering subsequent license renewals to extend the operating life to 80 years.

"The world's nuclear power plants were licensed to operate between 30 and 40 years, but many may be able to operate well in excess of that, to 60 or even 80 years," said Leonard Bond, the conference organizer from PNNL. "This conference will bring together researchers, designers, engineers, utility representatives, manufacturers and regulators from around the world to share information on technical and ageing issues that can lead to safe and reliable long-term operation of nuclear power plants." 

The Salt Lake gathering is the third PLiM conference and the first in the United States. Previous conferences were held in Budapest in 2002 and Shanghai in 2007. In addition to technical sessions, the conference will include poster sessions, panel discussions and an exhibition.

More than 350 attendees are expected, and will come from Argentina, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Pakistan, Romania, Russia, South Africa, Ukraine, Vietnam, the United States and more than 20 other nations.

Registration for the conference is closed, but media wishing to cover the conference should contact Greg Koller at (509) 372-4864; or Teri Ehresman at (208) 521-9882. Technical questions should be directed to Leonard Bond at (509) 554-4886. Conference logistics questions should be directed to Becky Ford at (509) 528-6741.

"Investing in an American economy that is built to last includes taking advantage of all of America's energy resources while working to improve efficiency," said U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu. "By making heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems in buildings more energy efficient, American businesses can save a significant amount of money by saving energy."

Completed for the Department of Energy, the report examines options for improving the efficiency of commercial rooftop systems called packaged HVACs, which combine compressors, fans and heat exchangers into one unit. Packaged HVACs regulate temperatures inside more than 60 percent of the commercial building floor space in the United States, where commercial buildings consume as much energy as about 90 million typical American homes each year. And about 35 percent of that is used by HVAC systems, which are often poorly maintained or ignored, causing them to run inefficiently.

"The potential savings from adding advanced controls to existing packaged air conditioners with gas furnaces is enormous," said PNNL engineer Srinivas Katipamula, who led the study. "The estimated savings depend on local climate and energy prices and range from a whopping 67 percent cost savings in San Francisco to a still-substantial 28 percent in Seattle."

For the report, Katipamula and his PNNL colleagues considered implementing four different control methods to existing rooftop packaged HVACs:

• Air-side economizers use cool outside air to chill the building instead of creating cool air with the HVAC compressor. Some building codes already require cooling systems to include these, unlike the three other controls examined by the PNNL team.
• Supply fan speed controls slow or speed up the ventilation fan that circulates the building's air based on whether or not a desired temperature or amount of fresh air has been reached instead of continually running the fan at full speed.
• Cooling capacity controls run the HVAC compressor at different speeds based on need.
• Demand-controlled ventilation slows or speeds up fans and air intake based on carbon dioxide levels inside the building instead of running ventilation fans at a constant rate.

The study team tracked the effects of using these methods with a building energy simulation software called EnergyPlus. The software created computer simulations that took into account 15 climate zones in 16 major U.S. cities.

They studied four types of commercial buildings: small offices of 5,500 square feet, stand-alone retail buildings of 25,000 square feet, strip malls of 22,500 feet and supermarkets of 45,000 square feet. More than 1,400 different simulations estimated the potential savings in electricity used to power fans and cooling compressors, as well as the gas used to produce heat. Energy savings were then translated into dollars and cents.

Different climates, different controls

In general, the researchers found that installing a multi-speed fan control had the greatest impact on energy savings in hot cities such as Miami. And demand-controlled ventilation created the best possible energy savings in colder cities such as Chicago, Duluth and Seattle.

The team reasoned that because ventilation fans generate some heat when they move, slowing fans with multi-speed fan control in hot climates could reduce the amount of chilling needed. And in colder climates, they suspected that demand-controlled ventilation prevents unnecessarily sending warm air outside, which then prompts HVAC system to create more warm air to maintain desired temperatures inside.

Big savings

When the research team added up all the numbers, they found the best possible percentage cost savings was 67 percent, which could occur when all four controls are added to a rooftop packaged HVAC at a small office building in San Francisco. And the minimum percentage cost savings was 28 percent and could come from adding all four controls to a supermarket in Seattle. The table below shows the team's calculations on each building types' average cost savings.

Their research also showed that Fairbanks, Alaska, could be home to the maximum annual dollar savings for all four building types. Fairbanks could experience savings as high as $52,217 per year at a supermarket and as low as $923 at a small office. The team reasoned that Fairbanks' dollar-saving advantage was due to its cold climate, which benefits more from the decreased ventilation that occurs with demand-controlled ventilation, as well as the city's relatively high energy costs. The table below shows the average dollar savings that each building type could experience by installing all four controls.

But savings weren't limited to cash and energy use. The team also found that a substantial amount of carbon emissions could be avoided if HVAC energy efficiency is increased. As many as sixteen 200-MW coal power plants — which generate enough energy to power 3,000 to 4,000 American homes — could sit idle if just half of the nation's packaged rooftop HVAC units on commercial buildings were retrofitted with controls, the simulations revealed.

Return on investment

Three companies currently manufacturer HVAC controllers, but only one company offers a product with all the control options that resemble the team's simulations, Katipamula said. To help the manufactures better understand their market, the report also examines potential prices for the controllers and how long it would take for building owners to recoup that cost.

Based on the estimated dollar savings, the team predicted a building owner could recoup his or her investment in a few years. For example, they looked at adding supply fan speed control and demand-controlled ventilation to a supermarket. If that store spends $7,523 to equip its HVAC system, it would see a return in three years, while it would take the same supermarket five years to see a return if the controls had a higher price tag of $12,539.

"Our report makes a convincing case for manufacturers to produce more advanced HVAC controllers and for building owners to adopt these energy-saving methods," Katipamula said.

Next, the team will test the estimated savings in the field. They're installing controllers into HVAC systems used on two rooftop units at an office building on PNNL's own campus in Richland, Wash. They're also planning to install several controllers in various commercial buildings across the United States. Once installed, the controllers will allow the researchers to measure real energy and costs savings.

The PNNL team will also expand its simulations to include more variables, such as looking at heat pumps to calculate potential energy savings. Heat pumps are more common in mild climates than the gas furnaces simulated for this report.

This research was funded by DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

REFERENCE: W. Wang, Y. Huang, S. Katipamula and M.R. Brambley, "Energy Savings and Economics of Advanced Control Strategies for Packaged Air-Conditioning Units with Gas Heat," December 2011, PNNL Report No. 20955 for U.S. Department of Energy.

In a study released online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition this week, the team at least doubled the number of proteins found to be subject to a type of regulation based on a sugar known as O-GlcNAc (oh-GLIK-nak). The O-GlcNAc system likely adds another layer of control to the proteins that serve as a brain cell's widgets and gears — control that might be muddled in Alzheimer's brains known to have problems in sugar metabolism.

"We found many novel proteins providing insights into new aspects of cell biology," said analytical biochemist Feng Yang of the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and lead author on the study. "We think O-GlcNAc is fine-tuning cellular processes."

In addition to finding hundreds of proteins modified by O-GlcNAc, the team found that almost all the O-GlcNAc proteins were also subject to the most common form of protein regulation, which uses small phosphate molecules to turn proteins on and off. This suggests a larger coordination between the two regulatory systems.

"These results show there's a level of complexity about how biology operates that we've been largely blind to," said PNNL's Richard D. Smith, who leads the proteomics team at PNNL. Proteomics researchers try to understand how a cell functions based on the numbers and types of its proteins at work, which are collectively known as the proteome (PRO-tee-ohm).

"Back during the Human Genome Project, we asked, how could so few genes produce the complexity of an organism or even a single cell, and how could minor variations in our DNA explain the diversity we see all around us? Clearly the proteome is the answer," said Smith.

Sugar Switch

Proteins are the tools, gears and gadgets that run a cell. Regulatory systems within cells turn proteins on and off by attaching or detaching small molecules to the proteins, like a switch. The most common switch involves adding or removing phosphates, and biologists have known for a long time that these switches can run amiss in cancer and other diseases. Drugs affect players in the phosphate regulatory system to try to fix the errors.

A couple decades ago, researchers found that O-GlcNAc, a kind of sugar, could also work like a switch, turning proteins on or off. Scientists found proteins decorated by O-GlcNAc, as well as other proteins that attach or remove the sugar — all essential parts to the system.

But they had trouble finding enough O-GlcNAc proteins to get the whole story. Few proteins bore the small sugar, and those that did tended to lose the accessory while being manhandled in the lab. Researchers could make up for some of these problems by starting with more tissue or cultured cells, but they knew if they wanted to look for these modifications in real-life scenarios such as clinical samples, they would need to be able to find the sugar with a small amount of starting material.

To overcome these difficulties, Smith, Yang and their colleagues at PNNL and four research institutions combined their expertise in the O-GlcNAc system with instruments developed at EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory on the PNNL campus. First they improved how they purified protein from mouse brain tissue to reinforce the sugar attached to proteins. Then they used instruments that excelled at detecting rare proteins in small samples.

In addition, they looked for the sugar-dotted proteins in mouse brain samples from engineered animals that had a mouse version of Alzheimer's. These mice make too much of three key proteins implicated in Alzheimer's disease in people, including the Tau protein, which forms the hallmark tangles in brain neurons.

Pack o' Proteins

To test how well their methods found O-GlcNAc proteins, the PNNL-led team started with  tissue from either healthy or diseased mouse brain tissue. From the healthy tissue, the team found 274 different proteins marked with O-GlcNAc. Many of them sported more than one sugar molecule, because the team found a total of 458 attachment sites on those 274 proteins — triple the number of sites found in any previous study. The large number of sites allowed the team to identify similarities between O-GlcNAc sites, as well as O-GlcNAc sites on previously unexplored proteins.

Of the 274 O-GlcNAc proteins, 106 had already been identified in other studies. These proteins held a variety of jobs, including forming part of a cell's scaffolding, or in nerve growth or in other nerve-related occupations such as learning and memory.

That left 168 newly-identified proteins. Based on what the proteins looked like, the team classified most of them as likely being involved in cell signaling, regulating how genes are expressed, or, again, in cell scaffolding.

The PNNL-led team then looked at the proteins found in the Alzheimer's-like mouse brain. They found about a third fewer O-GlcNAc-marked proteins. That result also supports earlier work that suggested there is damaged O-GlcNAc regulation in Alzheimer's brains in people.

Fraternizing Phosphates and Other Biology

One of the more exciting things the researchers found had to do with the most common regulatory system in cells, the phosphate system. More than 98 percent of the O-GlcNAc proteins also had sites that would accept a phosphate, suggesting those proteins are also under the control of that system. 

And about a quarter of the O-GlcNAc sites were close enough to the phosphate sites to interfere with that switch, suggesting cross-talk between the two types of regulation. A phosphate is smaller than O-GlcNAc and has a strong negative electrical charge. The sugar is neutral but bulkier. Those characteristics could have different effects on the structure of the protein and greatly increases the range of possible biological effects due to the complexity of the combined switching systems.

Lastly, until this study, most of the proteins known to be under O-GlcNAc control largely live their lives within the cells. But the PNNL-led team found a half-dozen proteins that had to be controlled by O-GlcNAc outside a cell, based on where their O-GlcNAc site fell on the body of the protein.

Now, the team is planning to measure both regulatory systems in concert.

"It's revealing to see how many proteins are modified. If we're going to understand biological systems, we need to understand the interplay of the different types of modifications," said Smith.

Scientists contributing to this work came from PNNL, New York State Institute for Basic Research in Developmental Disabilities, Staten Island, N.Y., Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, Md., the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va. and Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, N.Y.

This work was supported by PNNL, EMSL and the National Institutes of Health's National Center for Research Resources and National Institute of General Medical Sciences.

Reference: Joshua F. Alfaro, Cheng-Xin Gong, Matthew E. Monroe, Joshua T. Aldrich, Therese R.W. Clauss, Samuel O. Purvine, Zihao Wang, David G. Camp II, Jeffrey Shabanowitz, Pamela Stanley, Gerald W. Hart, Donald F. Hunt, Feng Yang, and Richard D. Smith, 2012. Tandem Mass Spectrometry identifies many mouse brain O-GlcNAcylated proteins including targets of an EGF domain-specific OGT, Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A Early Edition online the week of April 16, DOI 10.1073/pnas.1200425109. (http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1200425109)

Fluorescence is the key characteristic of a new biosensor developed by researchers at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. The biosensor, described in a paper published this week in the scientific journal PLoS ONE, includes fluorescent proteins embedded in a diatom shell that alter their glow when they are exposed to a particular substance.

"Like tiny glass sculptures, the diverse silica shells of diatoms have long intrigued scientists," said lead author and molecular biologist Kate Marshall, who works out of PNNL's Marine Sciences Laboratory in Sequim, Wash. "And the way our biosensor works could make diatoms even more attractive to scientists because it could pave the way for the development of novel, synthetic silica materials."

Diatoms are perhaps best known as the tiny algae that make up the bulk of phytoplankton, the plant base of the marine food chain that feeds the ocean's creatures. But materials scientists are fascinated by diatoms for another reason: the intricate, highly-ordered patterns that make up their microscopic shells, which are mostly made of silica. Researchers are looking at these minuscule glass cages to solve problems in a number of areas, including sensing, catalysis and environmental remediation.

PNNL Laboratory Fellow and corresponding author Guri Roesijadi found inspiration for this biosensor in previous work  by other researchers, who showed it's possible to insert proteins in diatom shells through genetic engineering. Using that work as a starting point, Roesijadi, Marshall and their PNNL colleagues aimed to use fluorescent proteins to turn diatoms into a biosensor. They specifically aimed to create a reagent-less biosensor, meaning one that detects a target substance on its own and without depending on another chemical or substance.

Well-equipped diatom

As a test case, the PNNL team inserted genes for their biosensor into Thalassiosira pseudonana, a well-studied marine diatom whose shell resembles a hatbox. The new genes allowed the diatoms to produce a protein that is the biosensor.

At the heart of the biosensor is the ribose-binding protein, which, as the name suggests, attaches to the sugar ribose. Each ribose-binding protein is then flanked by two other proteins — one that glows blue and another that glows yellow. This three-protein complex attaches to the silica shell while the diatom grows.

In the absence of ribose, the two fluorescent proteins sit close to one another. They're close enough that the energy in the blue protein's fluorescence is easily handed off, or transferred, to the neighboring yellow protein. This process, called fluorescence resonance energy transfer, or FRET, is akin to the blue protein shining a flashlight at the yellow protein, which then glows yellow.

But when ribose binds to the diatom, the ribose-binding protein changes its shape. This moves the blue and yellow fluorescent proteins apart in the process, and the amount of light energy that the blue protein shines on the yellow protein declines. This causes the biosensor to display more blue light.

Microscopic light show

Regardless of whether or not ribose is bound to the diatom's biosensor, the biosensor always emits some blue or yellow glow when it's exposed to energy under a microscope. But the key difference is how much of each kind of light is displayed.

The PNNL team distinguished between light from the two proteins with a fluorescence microscope that was equipped with a photon sensor. The sensor allowed them to measure the intensities of the unique wavelengths of light given off by each of the fluorescent proteins. By calculating the ratio of the two wavelengths, they could determine if the diatom biosensor was exposed to ribose, and how much of ribose was present.

The team also succeeded in making the biosensor work with the shell alone, after it was removed from the living diatom. Removing the living diatom provides researchers greater flexibility in how and where the silica biosensor can be used. The Office of Naval Research, which funded the research, believes biosensors based on modifying a diatom's silica shell may prove useful for detecting threats such as explosives in the marine environment.

"With this research, we've made our important first steps to show it's possible to genetically engineer organisms such as diatoms to create advanced materials for numerous applications," Marshall said.

Co-authors on the paper include scientists at EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL's Richland, Wash., campus. They used EMSL's mass spectrometry capabilities to verify the team had the correct ribose-binding and fluorescent proteins before adding them to the diatoms.

REFERENCE: Kathryn E. Marshall, Errol W. Robinson, Shawna M. Hengel, Liljana Pasa-Tolic, Guritno Roesijadi, "FRET Imaging of Diatoms Expressing a Biosilica-Localized Ribose Sensor," PLoS ONE, March 21, 2012, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0033771, http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0033771.

Published online in the journal Nano Letters last week, the study includes videos of the electrodes being charged at nanometer-scale resolution. Watching them in use can help researchers understand the strengths and weaknesses of the material.

"The electrodes expand as they get charged, and that shortens the lifespan of the battery," said lead researcher Chongmin Wang at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. "We want to learn how to improve their lifespan, because silicon-carbon nanofiber electrodes have great potential for rechargeable batteries."

Plus & Minus

Silicon has both advantages and disadvantages for use as a battery material. It has a high capacity for energy storage, so it can take on a hefty charge. Silicon's problem, though, is that it swells up when charged, expanding up to 3 times its discharged size. If silicon electrodes are packed tightly into a battery, this expansion can cause the batteries to burst. Some researchers are exploring nano-sized electrodes that perform better in such tight confines.

A multi-institution group led by PNNL's Wang decided to test nano-sized electrodes consisting of carbon nanofibers coated with silicon. The carbon's high conductivity, which lets electricity flow, nicely complements silicon's high capacity, which stores it.

Researchers at DOE's Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tenn., Applied Sciences Inc. in Cedarville, Ohio, and General Motors Global R&D Center in Warren, Mich. created carbon nanofibers with a thin layer of silicon wrapped around. They provided the electrodes to the team at PNNL to probe their behavior while functioning.

First, Wang and colleagues tested how much lithium the electrodes could hold and how long they lasted by putting them in a small testing battery called a half-cell. After 100 charge-discharge cycles, the electrodes still maintained a very good capacity of about 1000 milliAmp-hours per gram of material, five to 10 times the capacity of conventional electrodes in lithium ion batteries.

Although they performed well, the team suspected that the expansion and contraction of the silicon could be a problem for the battery's longevity, since stretching tends to wear things out. To determine how well the electrodes weather the repeated stretching, Wang popped a specially designed, tiny battery into a transmission electron microscope, which can view objects nanometers wide, in DOE's EMSL, the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory on the PNNL campus.

They zoomed in on the tiny battery's electrode using a new microscrope that was funded by the Recovery Act. This microscope allowed the team to study the electrode in use, and they took images and video while the tiny battery was being charged and discharged.

Not Crystal Glass

Previous work has shown that charging causes lithium ions to flow into the silicon. In this study, the lithium ions flowed into the silicon layer along the length of the carbon nanofiber at a rate of about 130 nanometers per second. This is about 60 times faster than silicon alone, suggesting that the underlying carbon improves silicon's charging speed.

As expected, the silicon layer swelled up about 300 percent as the lithium entered. However, the combination of the carbon support and the silicon's unstructured quality allowed it to swell evenly. This compares favorably to silicon alone, which swells unevenly, causing imperfections.

In addition to swelling, lithium is known to cause other changes to the silicon. The combination of lithium and silicon initially form an unstructured, glassy layer. Then, when the lithium to silicon ratio hits 15 to 4, the glassy layer quickly crystallizes, as previous work by other researchers has shown.

Wang and colleagues examined the crystallization process in the microscope to better understand it. In the microscope video, they could see the crystallization advance as the lithium filled in the silicon and reached the 15 to 4 ratio.

They found that this crystallization is different from the classic way that many substances crystallize, which builds from a starting point. Rather, the lithium and silicon layer snapped into a crystal all at once when the ratio hit precisely 15 to 4. Computational analyses of this crystallization verified its snappy nature, a type of crystallization known as congruent phase transition.

But the crystallization wasn't permanent. Upon discharging, the team found that the crystal layer became glassy again, as the concentration of lithium dropped on its way out of the silicon.

To determine if repeated use left its mark on the electrode, the team charged and discharged the tiny battery 4 times. Comparing the same region of the electrode between the first and fourth charging, the team saw the surface become rough, similar to a road with potholes.

The surface changes were likely due to lithium ions leaving a bit of damage in their wake upon discharging, said Wang. "We can see the electrode's surface go from smooth to rough as we charge and discharge it. We think as it cycles, small defects occur, and the defects accumulate."

But the fact that the silicon layer is very thin makes it more durable than thicker silicon. In thick silicon, the holes that lithium ions leave behind can come together to form large cavities. "In the current design, because the silicon is so thin, you don't get bigger cavities, just like little gas bubbles in shallow water come up to the surface. If the water is deep, the bubbles come together and form bigger bubbles."

In future work, researchers hope to explore the thickness of the silicon layer and how well it bonds with the underlying carbon to optimize the performance and lifetime of the electrodes.

MORE VIDEO: Late in this video, reflections change when the lithium-silicon crystallizes in the left-hand screen and dots flicker in the X-ray diffraction in the right-hand screen.

Reference: Chong-Min Wang, Xiaolin Li, Zhiguo Wang, Wu Xu, Jun Liu_, Fei Gao, Libor Kovarik_, Ji-Guang Zhang, Jane Howe, David J. Burton, Zhongyi Liu, Xingcheng Xiao, Suntharampillai Thevuthasan, and Donald R. Baer, 2012. In situ TEM investigation of congruent phase transition and structural evolution of nanostructured silicon/carbon anode for lithium ion batteries, Nano Letters March 2, doi: 10.1021/nl204559u. (http://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/nl204559u)

New research shows the bacteria help decompose the leaves and play a major role in turning the leaves into nutrients that may be important for both ants and fungi. The findings were published March 1 by The ISME Journal, a publication of the International Society for Microbial Ecology.

"This research provides some of the first tangible details about the fascinating symbiotic relationship between leafcutter ants, fungi and bacteria," said Kristin Burnum, a bioanalytical chemist at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Burnum is a co-author on the paper and led the study's protein analysis. "Understanding how bacteria turn plant matter into a source of energy in ant fungal gardens could also help improve biofuel production."

The gardens in question are initially sowed by the ants, which bring leaf pieces into their underground nests. From the leaves grow the fungus Leucoagaricus gongylophorus, traditionally thought of as the ants' food. The relationship between leafcutter ants and fungi has been known since 1874, but it wasn't until the late 1990s that scientists started to also identify bacteria in the underground gardens.

Since then, a lively debate has gone on about the bacteria's role. Because pure samples of the garden fungi grown in laboratories don't easily degrade cellulose, a molecule that gives plants structural stability, many scientists have argued the bacteria help decompose the leaves. Other researchers have proposed bacteria — like the microscopic bugs in our guts — help ants obtain nutrients from the leaves.

Lead author Frank Aylward of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Burnum and their co-authors set out to help resolve the debate by doing a comprehensive survey of the various bacteria species that live in the gardens and examining the suite of proteins those bacteria produce.  They traveled to a Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute site near Gamboa, Panama, and gathered samples of fungal gardens tended by two ant species, Atta colombica and Atta cephalotes.

Aylward and several others on the research team are part of the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, one of three Bioenergy Research Centers established by DOE's Office of Science in 2007 to accelerate research toward the development of cost-effective advanced biofuels from nonfood plant fiber. The University of Wisconsin-Madison leads the Great Lakes center.

To produce results that more accurately reflect the large diversity of real-world gardens, the team collected large samples with bits of leaves, ants, fungi and bacteria intermixed instead of just gathering samples of the bacteria they intended to study. This allowed them to better examine the entire community of bacteria that live in the gardens and prevented them from missing some bacterial species. The team then studied the bacterial community's genes and proteins - an approach known as metagenomics and metaproteomics.

The researchers sequenced their genetic samples at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's DOE Joint Genome Institute. With the help of an extensive library of bacterial genes developed by co-author Cameron Currie, team members at University of Wisconsin-Madison identified thousands of bacterial genetic sequences from the two ant gardens. More than two-thirds of the bacterial species found were from just a few groups. More than half of those identified belong to the family Enterobacteriaceae, whose members are known to ferment sugars and include the intestinal microbes that help animals digest food.

From the bacteria, Burnum and her PNNL colleagues in Richland examined proteins, the workhorses of the cell that perform the tasks needed to keep organisms alive and well.  They used mass spectrometers at EMSL, the Department of Energy's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL, to identify proteins in an A. colombica nest.

They found proteins that were involved a surprising number of different metabolic pathways, including:

• Breaking down complex sugars  that make plants tough and durable, but difficult to digest.
• Transporting sugars, allowing broken-down sugars to be used for energy.
• Making amino acids, the buildings blocks of proteins.
• Making vitamin B5, which is needed to both break down proteins, carbohydrates and fats and to make energy from nutrients.

When compared to all other bacteria in Currie's large library of bacterial genes, very few — just 0.2 to 0.6 percent — of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down cellulose. Instead, most of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down simpler sugars, indicating that perhaps fungi initially breaks down cellulose and the bacteria then turn the partially digested sugars that result into a variety of nutrients that could promote the fungi's growth or even nourish the ants themselves.

"Our results show that calling these 'fungal gardens' is pretty misleading; 'fungus-bacterial communities' would be far more accurate," Burnum said. "Bacteria are not only integral residents of these communities, but they perform essential tasks that keep the communities - and the ants that help cultivate them - living."

Next, the team plans to analyze the fungi, lipids and various metabolic products found in the gardens.

This study's findings and future results could advance the work of scientists who are looking at fungal enzymes to make biofuel out of plants. The enzymes, or biological catalysts, of fungi are exceptionally talented at breaking down cellulose in plants, making them a good model for large-scale biofuel production.

"It's apparent that neither fungi nor bacteria work in isolation when it comes to leafcutter ant gardens," Burnum said. "It's possible that the same goes for biomass conversion; perhaps both fungi and bacteria are needed to efficiently turn plants into biofuel."

REFERENCE:  Frank O. Aylward, Kristin E. Burnum, Jarrod J. Scott, Garret Suen, Susannah G. Tringe, Sandra M. Adams, Kerrie W. Barry, Carrie D. Nicora, Paul D. Piehowski, Samuel O. Purvine, Gabriel J. Starrett, Lynne A. Goodwin, Richard D. Smith, Mary S. Lipton, Cameron R. Currie. Metagenomic and metaproteomic insights into bacterial communities in leaf-cutter ant fungus gardens. The ISME Journal, Online publish date March 1, 2012. DOI: 10.1038/ISMEJ.2012.10. www.nature.com/ismej/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ismej201210a.html.

DOE'S Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov. The Joint Genome Institute and EMSL are also supported by the Office of Science.

The results provide clues to the nature of the Fermi resonance in other molecules, and will help researchers better understand details in chemical reactions. The team of researchers from the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory report their findings in the February 28 issue of the journal in Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics.

"We're happy to be able to say something new about something so old," said PNNL chemist and author Charles Windisch, Jr. "We figured out how the different carbon dioxide molecules are vibrating at some of the Fermi resonance frequencies. And, of course, we can calibrate our data with more accuracy now."

"Even to this day, people mark Raman spectra incorrectly," said PNNL computational chemist Vassiliki-Alexandra Glezakou. "It helps to know what we are looking at, if we are going to use certain bands as guidelines to understand molecular interactions."

Carbon Dioxide Conundrum

The PNNL researchers did not set out to study again a phenomenon that dates back to the 1930s. Instead, they wanted to investigate what happens when carbon dioxide is stored underground as part of a national research effort to reduce carbon emissions from power generation. To do so, researchers plan to inject carbon dioxide in an unusual form of the gas that behaves like a liquid due to being under high pressure, called supercritical. To follow supercritical carbon dioxide in chemical reactions, researchers often use a technique called Raman spectroscopy.

Raman spectroscopy is a way of capturing a molecule's vibration. Simple molecules can vibrate in well-defined modes such as stretching and bending, which correspond to peak frequencies on a graph. These peaks are as unique and reproducible as a fingerprint.

The number and position of these peaks in a spectrum can be predicted by quantum mechanics, but Fermi resonances result in unanticipated peaks due to a combination of two different vibrations, such as stretching and bending. First recognized in carbon dioxide and explained by Enrico Fermi in 1931, scientists agree that the Fermi peaks are the result of the mixing of the two vibrational modes, but they often label one of them as 'stretch' and the other as 'bend'. This labeling became a problem when PNNL researchers observed a 'flip' in the Raman spectrum of supercritical carbon dioxide.

Shift or Flip?

To follow reactions, researchers often use different versions of elements called isotopes. Normally, carbon dioxide contains carbon plus the isotope oxygen-16, the most common form of oxygen. By using a heavier isotope of oxygen with its own fingerprint, oxygen-18, PNNL researchers can track the fate of carbon dioxide when it reacts with minerals, particularly when there are other sources of oxygen present such as water.

In the Raman spectra of the lighter supercritical carbon dioxide, the pair of Fermi peaks included a weaker one at a lower frequency and a stronger one at higher frequency. When they replaced all of the oxygens with the heavier isotope, however, the peaks seemed to flip, with the stronger one appearing at a lower frequency instead.

At first, it was not clear how the two sets of Fermi peaks related to each other — whether the peaks were really a mirror image or if the stronger oxygen-16 peak somehow morphed into a weaker peak when heavy oxygen-18 was introduced. Typically, a heavier isotope will shift peaks to lower frequencies, although different modes are not necessarily affected by the same amount.

The researchers needed to unambiguously identify the peaks and to figure out how much bending and stretching modes contributed to each one. To do so, the team decided to simulate the carbon dioxide molecules with different oxygen isotopes on a computer and see if they could recreate the Raman spectra they saw in their experiments.

To the Computer

Using computing resources at EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL, Glezakou simulated carbon dioxide in supercritical conditions similar to those in the experiment. The molecules were "made" with either oxygen-16 or oxygen-18.

They analyzed the motion of the molecules to produce computational spectra that echoed the real spectra. In this way, the team was able to determine the percent of bending and stretching modes expected in each peak.

The results showed that with oxygen-16, the stronger peak at the higher frequency is due mostly to the stretching mode, while the weaker peak at the lower frequency is due mostly to the bending mode.

Oxygen-18, however, told a different story. The results with heavy carbon dioxide showed unequivocally that the light- and heavy-oxygen peaks were not exactly mirror images of each other. Carbon dioxide is mostly a linear molecule, so the bending motion is much less affected than the stretch when the oxygen-16 is replaced by its heavier isotope. As a result, the composition of the peaks does not remain the same.

"The heavier oxygen doesn't just shift the peaks. It changes their identity," said Glezakou. "And the bigger effects are on the stretching, because the peak with the most stretching has the biggest frequency shift."

Windisch added that the experimental results matched the computational ones nicely, in spite of the difficulty. "Our colleague Paul Martin here at PNNL had to build equipment so we could do these experiments at the pressures we needed. Not easy," he said.

Having nailed down the vibrational pedigree of these carbon dioxide molecules, they plan to use these results to understand better other reactions between carbon dioxide and a variety of minerals.

Reference: Charles F. Windisch Jr., Vassiliki-Alexandra Glezakou, Paul F. Martin, B. Peter McGrail and Herbert T. Schaef, Raman spectrum of supercritical C¹⁸O₂ and re-evaluation of the Fermi resonance, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., November 14, 2011, DOI 10.1039/c1cp22349f (http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2012/cp/c1cp22349f).

This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Fossil Energy.

Metal hydrides for thermal energy storage

Booth #315

Solar power technologies provide a source of clean electricity generation without emissions. To enhance storage efficiencies and expand applications, there is a need for new materials that can function at higher temperatures. PNNL scientists Ewa Ronnebro and Kevin Simmons, along with metallurgical materials scientist Zak Fang at University of Utah will receive more than $700,000 to investigate a metal hydride material that can store 10 times the amount of heat per mass than conventional molten salt. The team will first develop a metal hydride with a suitably long lifetime. If successful, they will then create a small prototype system.

Molecular heat pump for electric vehicles

Booth #313

Internal combustion engines in today's cars generate a lot of heat, which is great for heating the passenger cabin in winter. However, energy efficient electric vehicles produce very little excess heat, so providing electricity for the same amount of heat would reduce their driving range by as much as 40 percent. PNNL scientists Pete McGrail and Praveen Thallapally, and University of South Florida chemists Mike Zaworotko and Shengqian Ma will receive $800,000 to develop a material called an electrical metal-organic framework, or EMOF for short, for vehicle heating and cooling systems. The EMOF would work as a molecular heat pump, which efficiently circulates heat or cold as needed. By directly controlling the EMOF's properties with electricity, their design is expected to use much less energy than traditional heating and cooling systems. For example, a 5-pound EMOF-based heat pump the size of a 2-liter bottle could theoretically handle the heating and cooling needs of an electric vehicle with far less impact on driving distance.

High-efficiency adsorption chillers

Booth #313

Current building cooling systems account for approximately 13 percent of electrical energy consumption in the U.S. PNNL scientists Pete McGrail and Praveen Thallapally, and partner companies Power Partners, Inc., and Arkema, Inc., received $2.54 million to improve the efficiency and test new refrigerants in a type of air conditioning unit called an adsorption chiller. The chiller takes advantage of PNNL's metal-organic heat carrier technology and is powered by waste heat (or by heat from solar collectors) has few moving parts, and uses almost no electricity to operate.  PNNL will be presenting results on super-hydrophilic and super-fluorophilic sorbents that offer the potential to double the efficiency and reduce the size of today's commercially available chillers by one-third, making them affordable enough to be used more frequently in commercial buildings.

Manganese-based permanent magnet

Booth #317

PNNL materials scientist Jun Cui and others will receive $2.3 million to develop a replacement for rare earth magnets - commonly used in wind turbines and electric vehicles - based on an innovative nano-composite using manganese-based alloys. Manganese composites could potentially be twice as strong as current state-of-the-art magnets at higher temperatures, possibly eliminating the need for a cooling system. Importantly, they are based on inexpensive and abundant raw materials. The team will develop stronger magnets by combining modeling with high throughput experiments of various metal composite formulations that do not contain rare-earth materials. If developed successfully, these composite magnets will reduce dependence on expensive rare-earth material imports, and reduce the cost and improve efficiency of green technologies.

Planar Sodium-beta batteries

Booth #232

EaglePicher Technologies is teaming with PNNL to develop the next-generation sodium-beta batteries for the nation's large-scale energy storage needs. The planar, or flat, sodium beta battery technology offers several advantages over a cylindrical battery, including reduced costs associated with manufacturing. The planar technology also is scalable in size, enabling a wide range of power and energy requirements to be met with the same platform thereby increasing the potential market applications.  Finally, these planar cells can be operated at lower temperatures which increase the operational lifetime of the battery.  The final outcome of this project will have direct impact on establishing U.S. leadership in stationary storage and will demonstrate a competitive path to cost effective electrical energy storage. PNNL scientists John Lemmon and Vincent Sprenkle will be on hand in EaglePicher's booth to discuss the current status of the project.

Special exhibit: Creating the 21^st century power grid

Booth # 105

Maintaining a secure, reliable and affordable power system is paramount to national needs. PNNL is taking a system-wide approach to transform the nation's power grid into one that is increasingly clean, efficient, reliable and resilient. Tools developed at PNNL's Electricity Infrastructure Operations Center in Richland, Wash., can see the grid in real time like never before, help the power system respond to peak demand like never before, and help maintain a secure infrastructure. Carl Imhoff, lead of PNNL's grid business, will be available to discuss how the laboratory's expertise in system monitoring, demand response, renewable energy integration and energy storage, and cyber security and interoperability are revolutionizing the way grid operators, utilities and consumers can realize the benefits of a smarter power system.

Novel Membrane Air Dehumidifier

Booth #818

A team led by ADMA Products, and including the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and Energy Science Laboratory of Texas A&M University, is working to improve the efficiency of air cooling. The team is developing thin flat sheet molecular sieve membranes, made by Dr. Liu's team at PNNL, into prototype devices for efficient air dehumidification and conditioning. The moisture in humid air tends to condense into liquid water during air cooling, which reduces the overall efficiency for the process. Although presence of moisture is ubiquitous, currently there are no cheap and energy- efficient solutions to remove moisture. The membrane being developed by this team continuously sieves water molecule out of a humid air stream as it flows over the membrane surface. Thus, the moisture is removed without changing the temperature and pressure of incoming fresh air. The technology enables more than 50% energy savings for air conditioning in a hot humid climate, compared to the conventional technologies.  The thin metal foil-like design feature and exceptionally high water vapor permeance of the membrane could facilitate the mass production of a low-cost, compact dehumidification device.

Thermoelastic Cooling with University of Maryland

A team led by University of Maryland and including Pacific Northwest National Laboratory proposes to demonstrate a 0.01-ton prototype for cooling based on thermoelastic shape memory alloys with the goal of establishing the commercial viability of thermoelastic cooling. Thermoelastic cooling systems can be 175 percent more efficient than conventional vapor compression technology, currently used for 90 percent of U.S. space cooling. Replacing vapor compression technology with thermoelastic cooling will reduce U.S. annual primary electricity consumption by up to 2.2. quads per year, the equivalent of 250 metric tons per year of carbon dioxide emissions. Thermoelastic cooling refrigerant is a solid state technology, which eliminates the need for high global warming potential refrigerants and requires a smaller operational footprint.

The study, led by University of California, Irvine air chemist Barbara Finlayson-Pitts, combined alpha-pinene, a common ingredient in household cleaners such as Pine Sol and outdoor emissions, with oxides of nitrogen and ozone to mimic smog buildup. Atmospheric chemist Alla Zelenyuk at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory evaluated millions of the artificial smog particles one-by-one using a one-of-a-kind, 900-pound instrument known as SPLAT (a single particle laser ablation time-of-flight mass spectrometer).

SPLAT lives at EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL. The researchers also employed a 26-foot-long "aerosol flow tube" at the AirUCI unit.

"Being able to study individual particles gives us so much detail about how pollution evolves," said Zelenyuk. "Incorporating what we found about these particles into computer models will help in modeling pollution and climate as well."

Read the entire release from the University of California, Irvine here.

Reference: Véronique Perraud, Emily A. Bruns, Michael J. Ezell, Stanley N. Johnson, Yong Yua, M. Lizabeth Alexander, Alla Zelenyuk, Dan Imre, Wayne L. Chang, Donald Dabdub, James F. Pankow, and Barbara J. Finlayson-Pitts, 2012. Nonequilibrium atmospheric secondary organic aerosol formation and growth, Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A February 21, 2012, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1119909109

X-ray microscopy seen as next wave in structural biology research

Feb. 17, 10-11:30 a.m., Room 208-209, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center

Snapshots of proteins in repose might someday be replaced by views of proteins caught in action, if researchers presenting at AAAS have their way. Researchers will explore how X-ray imaging can surpass X-ray crystallography for gathering detailed structural and functional information, even going as far as CAT-scan-like tomography of cells at the nanometer scale.

X-ray crystallography has served structural biologists well — researchers who painstakingly purify individual proteins, DNA or other molecules of interest, form them into crystals and bombard them with X-rays to learn what they look like, how they work and how they've evolved over time. But with more than 60,000 unique molecules crystallized, some researchers, such as PNNL technologist Louis Terminello, say the ones relatively easy-to-crystallize are out of the way and biologists need a new tool for structural biology. Terminello has assembled this symposium to explore X-ray imaging as that next powerful tool.

"X-ray imaging allows you to peer through a collection of cells and tissues and keep things as close to their natural state as possible," said Terminello. "Other methods require processes that perturb reality. With the advent of high spatially resolved X-ray technology, we are just on the edge of X-ray microscopy that can show us the architecture inside cells." Terminello hopes the X-ray microscope will transform structural biology the way van Leeuwenhoek's microscope created the field of biology centuries ago.

• Organizer: Louis Terminello, lead scientist for PNNL's Chemical Imaging Initiative, an R&D effort to allow scientists to go from observing to manipulating systems on a molecular level.
• Anton Barty, researcher at the Centre for Free-Electron Laser Science, Hamburg, Germany. Barty will discuss how brief, intense X-ray pulses from free-electron lasers can record high-resolution structural information from biological objects such as viruses or large molecules before the onset of radiation damage.
• Carolyn Larabell, biologist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California, San Francisco. Larabell will present high-resolution 3-D tomographic reconstructions of cells based on her work with soft X-ray tomography (SXT), a nanometer-scale technology similar to CAT scans. Larabell has used SXT to study the effects of host-parasite interactions, antimicrobial agents on pathogenic yeast and how DNA and other molecules are organized within the nucleus of mammalian cells.
• Chris Jacobsen, physicist at Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory and Northwestern University, Illinois. Jacobsen will discuss using hard X-rays (those used to detect broken bones) to view trace elements in cells in three dimensions. Placing metals in context within cells will help clarify their role in health and disease.

REFERENCE: "Understanding Cellular Machinery Through X-Ray Imaging," Feb. 17, 10-11:30 a.m., Room 208-209, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center, http://aaas.confex.com/aaas/2012/webprogram/Session4091.html. Media contact: Mary Beckman, cell phone at conference: (208) 520-1415.

Integrating society with climate science

Feb. 17, 1:30-4:30 p.m., Room 205-207, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center

Hefty technical reports aren't always the best way to help the public and policymakers understand climate change's potential impacts. But detailed scientific tomes have historically been the main communication vehicle for climate researchers. Researchers will discuss innovative ways to make climate research more approachable and understandable for society at a Friday AAAS symposium.

The session will include Richard Moss, a PNNL climate change impacts scientist, who will discuss how to relate data from global climate and socioeconomic models to local and regional needs.  Moss — who works out of the Joint Global Change Research Institute at the University of Maryland — helped develop Representative Concentration Pathways, comprehensive scenarios that portray different greenhouse gas concentrations the world could experience. The data from these scenarios is being used in global climate models to update climate change projections. At the same time, Moss and his colleagues are combining the scenarios with socioeconomic factors such as population growth and technology use.

Moss suggests it would be easier to see how local and regional decisions could be affected by climate change by enabling decision makers to relate these global scenarios to local and regional concerns. For example, municipal planners could use these scenarios to test how different zoning and water resource management plans would play out under different combinations of climate change, population growth and more. Moss will describe methods being tested now in the U.S. Climate Assessment, which is scheduled for completion in 2013. He serves on the federal advisory committee overseeing the report and is leading development of scenarios for the report's preparation.

REFERENCE: "Beyond Climate Models: Rethinking How to Envision the Future with Climate Change," Feb. 17, 1:30-4:30 p.m., Room 205-207, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center, http://aaas.confex.com/aaas/2012/webprogram/Session4604.html. Media contact: Franny White, cell phone at conference: (360) 333-4793.

Stabilizing carbon dioxide levels

Feb. 17, 1:30-4:30 p.m., Room 114-115, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center

PNNL soil scientist and climate change modeler Cesar Izaurralde will serve as a discussant during a symposium about the implications of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations and how to mitigate such increases.

REFERENCE: "Toward Stabilization of Net Global Carbon Dioxide Levels," Feb. 17, 1:30-4:30 p.m., Room 114-115, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center, http://aaas.confex.com/aaas/2012/webprogram/Session4495.html. Media contact: Mary Beckman, cell phone at conference: (208) 520-1415.

Working together to bounce back from disaster

Feb. 18, 10-11:30 a.m., Room 211, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center

While examining two of the world's largest environmental crises in recent history — the 2011 Japanese earthquake, tsunami and nuclear emergency and the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the U.S.'s Gulf of Mexico — a group of experts will discuss how communities can better bounce back from disasters. The symposium's speakers will discuss how governments can work with the public, groups and businesses to help communities prepare to more quickly overcome the hardships that inevitably follow an emergency. The symposium participants and what they will discuss are as follows:

• Moderator: Ann Lesperance, deputy director of Northwest Regional Technology Center for Homeland Security at PNNL. Lesperance develops regional programs to accelerate the deployment of homeland security technologies by working with emergency management and the responder community.
• Nancy Kinner, co-director of the Coastal Response Research Center at the University of New Hampshire. Kinner will discuss how Deepwater Horizon spill response evolved and how state and federal politics as well as a desire for 24-7 information complicated the response.
• Kumi Fujisawa Tsunoda, co-founder of the Japan-based Think Tank SophiaBank. Fujisawa will discuss the issues and challenges that Japan is facing as a result of the tsunami and lessons learned during the crisis.
• David Kaufman, director of Policy and Program Analysis at the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Kaufman will discuss FEMA's efforts on community-oriented approaches to effectively prevent, prepare, respond, mitigate and recover from any disaster.

REFERENCE: "Responding to and Recovering from Catastrophic Events: The Road to Resilience," Feb. 18, 10-11:30 a.m., Room 211, West Building, Vancouver Convention Center, http://aaas.confex.com/aaas/2012/webprogram/Session4580.html. Media contact: Franny White, cell phone at conference: (360) 333-4793.

The annual award honors directors of federal laboratories who have made significant contributions that support technology transfer both inside and outside their organizations. Kluse has served as laboratory director since 2007. Between 2007 and 2011, PNNL:

• Filed 1,216 invention disclosures.
• Received 217 U.S. patents and dozens of foreign patents.
• Issued 147 new licenses.
• Earned 16 R&D 100 awards.
• Earned 12 FLC Awards for Excellence in Technology Transfer.

Under Kluse's leadership, PNNL has been involved in the formation of Innovate Washington, a nonprofit organization that aims to accelerate technological innovation in Washington state by bringing together universities, national labs, entrepreneurs and others involved in technology transfer. Kluse is also a frequent public advocate for the strategic alignment of research with technology transfer and strongly supported the streamlining of PNNL's technology transfer operations.

"We have a great team of commercialization leaders and researchers here at PNNL," Kluse said. "It's their hard work and commitment to producing results every day that makes recognition like this possible."

"Mike is a very deserving recipient of this award, and PNNL is fortunate to have such a strong advocate of technology commercialization as its leader," said Cheryl Cejka, PNNL's technology commercialization director. "With his support, we're consistently improving the way we approach commercialization at PNNL, and elevating our performance and our impact at the state and national levels. We're seeing excellent results on many fronts, and his leadership is significant in enabling our success."

The Federal Laboratory Consortium announced today that PNNL is receiving a 2012 Excellence in Technology Transfer award. The consortium is a nationwide network that encourages federal laboratories to transfer lab-developed technologies to commercial markets. PNNL has been honored by the FLC more than any other federal laboratory with this award, collecting 75 awards since the program began in 1984. The award will be presented May 3 at the consortium's annual meeting in Pittsburgh, Penn.

Improving protein investigations with new, durable electrospray tips

Scientists can better understand larger biological molecules such as proteins with the help of a tiny glass tube, called an emitter, that's used in electrospray ionization mass spectrometry. PNNL scientists developed a new way to manufacture emitters that is being used by Michrom Bioresources, Inc. of Auburn, Calif. Mass spectrometer instruments equipped with the improved emitters can advance research related to human health, the environment, petrochemicals, drug development and more.

Electrospray ionization mass spectrometry examines macromolecules and other chemicals of interest by mixing them in a liquid and using an electrically charged emitter to turn the liquid sample into charged particles that are directed into a mass spectrometer. Traditionally, the tapered ends of emitters are made by heating a glass capillary and pulling until the end forms a fine tip. But this method can also make the capillary's narrow opening — which is as wide as a horse hair — even smaller at the tip. This often causes particles to get stuck in the tip, which produces unreliable readings and costly instrument downtime. PNNL's process forms the tapered end by etching capillary tubes in a hydrofluoric acid solution. The method consistently creates an external taper without changing the capillary's internal diameter, which allows emitters to spray aerosols at extremely low, controlled rates without clogging. This enables more of the sample to be analyzed by the mass spectrometer, which helps scientists learn more about the molecules they study.

PNNL licensed the patents behind the technique to Michrom in a matter of months after helping the company evaluate the new tips. Michrom began selling the new emitters as part of its CaptiveSpray^TM ion source in October 2010. Six months later, Michrom was acquired by Bruker Corporation, which could expand opportunities for the technology's use.

More information about PNNL innovations available for license can be found online at http://availabletechnologies.pnl.gov/default.aspx. Business inquiries can be directed to 1-888-375-PNNL or techcomm@pnl.gov.

The analysis is the first time researchers have accurately quantified the molecular-scale interactions between the gases — either hydrogen or methane, aka natural gas — and the water molecules that form cages around them. A team of researchers from the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory published the results in Chemical Physics Letters journal online December 22, 2011.

The results could also provide insight into the process of replacing methane with carbon dioxide in the naturally abundant "water-based reservoirs," according to the lead author, PNNL chemist Sotiris Xantheas.

"Current thinking is that you need large amounts of energy to push the methane out, which destroys the scaffold in the process," said Xantheas. "But the computer modeling shows that there is an alternative low energy pathway. All you need to do is break a single hydrogen bond between water molecules forming the cage — the methane comes out, and then the hydrate reseals itself."

Cagey Ice

Gas hydrates — especially methane hydrates, which store natural gas — look like ice but actually hold burnable fuel. Naturally found deep in the ocean, water and gas interweave in the hydrates, but little is known about their chemical structure and processes occurring at the molecular level. They have been known to cause problems for the petroleum industry because they tend to clog pipes and can explode. A methane hydrate produced the bubble of methane gas that contributed to 2010's Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

In previous work, Xantheas and colleagues used computer algorithms and models to examine the water-based, ice-like scaffold that holds the gas. Water molecules form individual cages made with 20 or 24 molecules. Multiple cages join together in large lattices. But those scaffolds were empty in the earlier analysis.

To find out how fuels can be accommodated inside the water cages, Xantheas and PNNL colleague Soohaeng Yoo Willow built computer models of the cages with either hydrogen gas — in which two hydrogen atoms are bound together — or methane gas, a small molecule made with one carbon and four hydrogen atoms.

In the hydrogen hydrates, which could potentially be used as materials for hydrogen fuel storage, a small hollow cage made from 20 water molecules could hold up to a maximum of five hydrogen molecules and a larger cage made from 24 water molecules could hold up to seven.

The maximum storage capacity equates to about 10 weight-percent, or the percentage of hydrogen by mass in the chunks of ice, although packing hydrogen in that tight puts undue strain on the system. The Department of Energy's goal for hydrogen storage — to make the fuel practical — is above 5.5 weight-percent.

Experimentally, hydrogen storage researchers typically measure much less storage capacities. The computer model showed them why: The hydrogen molecules tended to leak out of the cages, reducing the amount of hydrogen that could be stored.

The researchers found that adding a methane molecule to the larger cages in the pure hydrogen hydrate, however, prevented the hydrogen gas from leaking out. The computer model showed the researchers that they could store the hydrogen at high pressure and practical temperatures, and release it by reducing the pressure, which melts it.

Water Gates

Understanding how the gas interacts and moves through the cages can help chemists or engineers store gas and remove it at will. Willow and Xantheas' computer simulations showed that hydrogen molecules could migrate through the cages by passing between the figurative bars of the water cages. However, the cages also had gates: Sometimes a low-energy bond between two water molecules broke, causing a water molecule to swing open and let the hydrogen molecule drift out. The "gate" closed right after the molecule passed through to reform the lattice.

With methane hydrates, some fuel producers want to remove the gas safely to use it. Others see the emptied cages as potential storage sites for carbon dioxide, which could theoretically keep it out of the atmosphere and ocean, where it warms the earth and acidifies the sea. So, Willow and Xantheas tested how methane could migrate through the cages.

The water cages were only big enough to comfortably hold one methane molecule, so the chemists stuffed two methanes inside and watched what happened. Quickly, one of the water molecules forming the cage swung open like a gate, allowing one methane molecule to escape. The gate then slammed shut as the remaining methane scooted into the middle of the cage.

"This process is important because it can happen with natural gas. It shows how methane can move in the natural world," said Xantheas. "We hope this analysis will help with the technical issues that need to be addressed with gas hydrate research and development."

Xantheas said performing computer simulations with carbon dioxide instead of methane might help determine whether it's chemically feasible to store carbon dioxide in hydrates.

This work was supported by the Department of Energy Office of Science. Computer resources used were at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center at DOE's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif.

Reference: Soohaeng Yoo Willow and Sotiris S. Xantheas, 2011/12. Enhancement of Hydrogen Storage capacity in Hydrate Lattices, Chem. Phys. Lett. Dec. 22, 2011, doi: 10.1016/j.cplett.2011.12.036. (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0009261411015314)

With the ability to compute as fast as about 20,000 typical personal computers combined, the Olympus supercomputer is the first large-scale computer exclusively available to PNNL researchers and their collaborators.

"Taking a cue from Washington state's Mount Olympus, this computer is enabling PNNL scientists to reach new scientific heights — and at a low cost," said Kevin Regimbal, director of the new PNNL Institutional Computing program. "PNNL has pooled its resources in a tough economy to build the best possible computational resource that will enable new scientific discoveries."

Before, PNNL research staff purchased smaller computer systems for their specific research project needs, but the size and power of those systems were limited to individual project budgets. Now PNNL research projects can use Olympus.

"PNNL is getting more computer power for its investment, since costs are reduced when we purchase components in large volumes," Regimbal said.  The system's larger size also allows scientists to complete significantly more complex calculations, which help them dig deeper into their research areas, he added.

The initial purchase and installation of Olympus cost $4.4 million. About $3.9 million of that came from internal lab funding for general computing capabilities, while $500,000 came from individual PNNL research projects that invested in specific capabilities needed for their work.

Energy-efficient cooling

Unlike other large-scale computers, Olympus doesn't use air conditioning to remain cool. Instead, it uses water. The novel system uses a closed loop of water that absorbs the heat generated by Olympus as it crunches data.

The system is expected to use about 70 percent less energy than traditional computer cooling with air conditioning, which could save PNNL as much as $61,000 a year on Olympus' cooling costs.

Discovery through computation

Olympus is the heart of the new PNNL Institutional Computing program, which aims to advance scientific discovery through computational science. The cluster became fully operational in mid-October 2011 and it's already working on many PNNL research projects. Olympus is helping analyze how power grids of the future could operate and design better batteries for energy storage.

The system will also be used to improve computer models developed at PNNL, such as the NW Chem computational chemistry suite and STOMP, which simulates the movement of water and contaminants below ground. And PNNL is encouraging its scientists who may not normally use computation as part of their research to consider incorporating it in their next project with the help of the new system.

"High performance computing and simulation will be essential to future scientific discoveries.  Olympus allows PNNL to be a player in that future," said Steven Ashby, PNNL's deputy director of science & technology. "It also will help us to nurture a culture of computational science that will enable our scientists and engineers to solve some of the most pressing problems facing the nation."

Olympus Fast Facts:

• Theoretical peak processing speed of 162 Teraflops, meaning Olympus can complete computations as fast as about 20,000 typical personal computers combined.
• 80 Gigabytes per second of disk bandwidth, meaning it can read and write information to a disk about 800 times faster than a typical personal computer.
• 38.7 Terabytes of total memory, equaling the memory of about 10,000 typical personal computers combined.
• 4 Petabytes of total disk space provided by Advanced HPC. The system's disk space is the same as about 4,000 typical personal computers or 80,000 standard DVDs combined.
• 604 computer nodes provided by Atipa, including 1,200 dual AMD Interlagos 16-core processors
• About 3.75 miles of interconnect cable provided by Atipa, including a 648-port QLogic core switch
• Motivair Chilled Door rear-door rack cooling system
• A graphic processing unit (GPU) testbed of 32 nodes, with each node consisting of a dual AMD Interlagos 16-core processor running at 2.1 Ghz, 64 Gigabytes of memory, 1 Terabyte of local disk space, a Quad Data Rate InfiniBand network and one NVIDIA Tesla M2090 GPU.

Reporting their findings December 12 in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, co-author atmospheric chemist Xiaohong Liu at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National laboratory said, "In addition to the emission controls, the weather was very important in reducing pollution. You can see the rain washing pollution out of the sky and wind transporting it away from the area."

Liu and colleague Chun Zhao at PNNL and at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing took advantage of the emission controls China put into play before and during the August Olympics to study the relative contributions of both planning and nature. Chinese officials restricted driving, temporarily halted pollution-producing manufacturing and power plants, and even relocated heavy polluting industries in preparation for the games.

To find out if the controls worked as well as people hoped, the researchers modeled the pollution and weather conditions in the area before, during and after the Olympics. They compared the model's results with measured amounts of pollution, which matched well.

Adding up the sources of pollution and the sinks that cleared it out, the team found that emission sources dropped up to a half in the week just before and during the Olympics. And while some pollution got washed out by rain or fell out of the sky, most of it got blown away by wind.

"They got very lucky. There were strong storms right before the Olympics," said Liu.

In addition to rain, wind also helped. Beijing is bordered on the south by urban areas and on the north by mountains, so wind blowing north would carry more pollution into the city. Examining the direction of the wind, the researchers saw that it generally blew south in the time period covering the Olympic period.

"The area we looked at is about 50 miles south. This suggests that emission controls need to be on a regional scale rather than just a local scale," said Liu.

The importance of regional controls meshes well with previous research on 2008 Olympics air quality that focused on nitrogen-based pollutants.

Next, the researchers will be examining the effect of pollution on other weather events and climate change in China. Pollutants are very small particles, and some suspect they might be causing fog to form rather than rain due to numerous pollution particles in China, Liu said.

This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, and the Ministry of Environmental Protection of China.

Reference: Yi Gao, Xiaohong Liu, Chun Zhao, and Meigen Zhang. Emission controls versus meteorological conditions in determining aerosol concentrations in Beijing during the 2008 Olympic Games, 2011 Atmos. Chem. Phys. 11, 12437-12451, DOI 0.5194/acp-11-12437-2011 (http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/11/12437/2011/acp-11-12437-2011.html).

The PNNL honorees and the AAAS sections that elected them are: Nathan Baker, chemistry; Theodore (Ted) Bowyer, physics; Karl Mueller, chemistry; Karin Rodland, biological sciences; and Hussein Zbib, engineering.

The five will be honored at an induction ceremony Feb. 18, 2012 at the AAAS annual meeting in Vancouver, Canada.

The five selections bring the Richland-based national laboratory's total of AAAS fellows to 52.

Nathan Baker

Baker's research is in the areas of computational biophysics, nanotechnology, and informatics.  He currently serves as the chief scientist for Signature Sciences at PNNL and the laboratory's Signature Discovery Initiative.  Signatures are distinguishing collections of features that identify, detect or predict a phenomena of interest, such as cyber intrusion, energy grid failure or disease progression. 

Baker is actively involved in the development of new algorithms and software for computational biology and modeling in support of several research projects.  He leads a National Cancer Institute activity called the caBIG Nanotechnology Working Group that is developing computational methods for the prediction of nanomaterial properties and the design of improved nanoparticles.  He is also chair for an American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) subcommittee on nanotechnology informatics that is working to develop new standards for data sharing and analysis in nanotechnology.  Baker is an editorial board member for the Biophysical Journal and editor-in-chief for Computational Science & Discovery.

After his research training at the University of California, San Diego, Baker joined the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at Washington University in St. Louis in 2002 and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2006.  He joined PNNL in 2010.  Baker earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa and a doctorate from UC San Diego.

Ted Bowyer

Bowyer is an internationally recognized expert in nuclear nonproliferation and nuclear physics, specifically the detection of extremely low level airborne radioactive emissions that are definitive signatures for nuclear explosions. 

At PNNL, he manages the Nuclear Explosion Monitoring and Policy program.  In addition to performing fundamental and applied research in the development of systems to detect signs of proliferation, Bowyer has served as a scientific advisor on issues related to the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization.  He has also served as an advisor to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.S. State Department, National Academy of Sciences and at the Conference on Disarmament.

Bowyer joined PNNL in 1995 and was named a Laboratory Fellow in 2011.  He is a recipient of the Federal Laboratory Consortium Award for the design of the Automated Radioxenon Sampler-Analyzer, or ARSA, which detects nuclear detonations by analyzing the atmosphere for traces of radioactive material that seeps from underground nuclear explosions.   He earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan, and a doctorate from Indiana University in Bloomington.

Karl Mueller

Mueller's research focuses on the development and utilization of solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance, or NMR, techniques to address unresolved questions in materials and environmental science that require advanced characterization tools and multi-disciplinary approaches.  Mueller joined PNNL in 2010 after serving 17 years as a professor at Penn State University.  At PNNL, Mueller is establishing a research program that uses novel NMR methods to address problems such as the development and characterization of industrial catalysts and the molecular-level understanding of the fate and transport of pollutants in the environment. 

Mueller is based at EMSL, the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory located on the PNNL campus.  Before joining the PNNL staff at EMSL, Mueller was an active and prolific EMSL user, and was a member of EMSL's User Advisory Committee from 2007 to 2010

Mueller is a Laboratory Fellow, the highest rank awarded to scientists and engineers at PNNL.  He earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry from the University of Rochester, a Certificate of Post Graduate Studies from Cambridge University in England, and a doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley.  He remains on the Penn State faculty and is an adjunct faculty member at Washington State University.

Karin Rodland

Rodland, a cancer cell biologist, is the science lead for National Institutes of Health programs at PNNL.  She has an international reputation for using proteomics — the study of the structure and function of proteins — to identify biomarkers that can provide early detection of cancer and other diseases. Rodland's research is focused on understanding the fundamental differences between cancer cells and their normal counterparts, which can assist in early detection of diseases.

Before coming to PNNL, Rodland spent 17 years on the faculty at the Oregon Health Sciences University in Portland where she focused, among other projects, on characterizing "signal pathways," or chemical reactions in cells, to detect ovarian cancer.  At PNNL, Rodland has been recognized for taking a systems biology approach to her research, characterizing the complex interactions between various signaling pathways in breast cancer.  She has also promoted the use of PNNL's proteomics capabilities for the discovery of biomarkers for cancer and other diseases. She has funding from the National Cancer Institute to integrate PNNL's proteomic capabilities with gene-level studies conducted by The Cancer Genome Atlas to develop biomarkers for breast and ovarian cancer.

Rodland was named a Laboratory Fellow in 2008.  She earned a bachelor's degree in biology from Hood College in Frederick, Md., and a doctorate in biology from Syracuse University.

Hussein Zbib

Zbib's research focuses on the behavior of materials — particularly the thermo-mechanical behavior — at the nano and micro scales in an effort to create more durable materials that will stand stress.

On the small end of the spectrum, nanometer to micrometer, his work includes investigating the physical characteristics and mechanical performance of metals and composites with implications to nanostructured materials and thin films, such as those used in micromechanical systems, microelectronics and medical diagnostics. On the large end of the length scale spectrum, micrometer to macrometer, his research focuses on the behavior of metals and geological materials under extreme conditions, such as shockwaves, metal forming and high speed machining, superplastic forming, as well as earthquake and soil engineering.

Zbib joined PNNL in 2011 and has a dual appointment, serving as a professor of mechanical and materials engineering at Washington State University as well as a Laboratory Fellow at PNNL.  Zbib earned bachelor's and master's degrees and a doctorate from Michigan Technological University in Houghton, Mich.  He is a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, or ASME, a member of the Lebanese Academy of Sciences and serves as editor of the Journal of Engineering Materials and Technology.

Understanding Human and Environmental Systems at Regional Scales

As the Earth's climate system responds to increased atmospheric greenhouse gases, changes will occur to different regions of the world. Crops may fail in one area and blossom in another, fresh water might become rare or instead flood human settlements or reservoirs, or the demand for energy might overwhelm some power systems as cooling and heating needs change. To aid decision-makers such as politicians and resource managers better understand their options, PNNL researcher Kathy Hibbard and colleagues are developing a framework that knits together climate, economics, human and natural resources on regional scales. Various models of regional climate, crop productivity, socio-economics, energy and technology changes form the skeleton of an integrated Regional Earth System Model, or iRESM. The computational challenges of putting these models together will require novel solutions. For example, one model component divides the United States up into equal grids while others use state boundaries or utility zones. The time scales that different models use to simulate events range from seconds to years to decades. Using a 10-state region in North America as a pilot study, the research team from PNNL and the Joint Global Change Research Institute in College Park, Md., will be guided by needs of stakeholders to build a modeling framework that analyses supply and demand of variables related to water, food, energy, and buildings.

GC22C-01: Regionally Integrated Earth System Modeling, Dec. 6, 10:20 a.m., Moscone West Rm 3003 in GC22C Regional Climate Modeling 2: Integrated Earth Systems Modeling at Global and Regional Scales. Media contact: Mary Beckman, mary.beckman@pnnl.gov, (509) 375-3688.

Estimating global, on-shore potential for power from wind

Experts say wind power has the potential to supply a much larger portion of global energy. But how much more? PNNL scientists used higher-resolution, on-shore wind speed data to estimate how much power wind could provide regionally and globally, and at what cost. They also investigated the uncertainties that surround wind supply estimates, such as land use suitability, turbine cost and financing assumptions. For example, estimates can vary greatly based upon how land suitability is measured, such as the assumed amount of cropland that can be used for wind development. Less impactful to the estimate is the cost of connecting wind resources to the existing transmission grid. PNNL's Yuyu Zhou and his team will present a poster that explains the research and results.

GC41D-0861: Global Onshore Wind Energy Potential and Its Uncertainties. Dec. 8, 8 a.m. - 12 noon, Moscone South, Halls A-C. Media contact: Annie Haas, anne.haas@pnnl.gov, (509) 375-3732.

Getting to know the in-betweens of carbon sequestration

A new kind of nuclear magnetic resonance analysis can help scientists better evaluate the potential of underground sites to safely sequester greenhouse gas carbon dioxide emissions. The technique, called high-pressure magic angle spinning NMR, allows researchers for the first time to understand the details of the multi-step chemical reactions that turn supercritical carbon dioxide into solid mineral compounds in situ, or under the same conditions that they would occur underground. Those details include identifying the reaction intermediates, which could help evaluate how well specific sites might sequester carbon dioxide into stable solids. PNNL's John Loring will present a poster that explains high-pressure magic angle spinning NMR and its analysis of high-pressure, high-temperature carbonation reactions involving the minerals brucite and forsterite. Instruments for the technique were developed at EMSL, DOE's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory user facility at PNNL.

GC51B-0967: Mineral Carbonation in Wet Supercritical CO2: An in situ High-Pressure Magic Angle Spinning Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Study, Dec. 9, 8 a.m. - 12 noon, Moscone South, Halls A-C. NOTE: John Loring is taking the place of Flaviu Turcu, who was originally scheduled to present. Media contact: Franny White, franny.white@pnnl.gov, (509) 375-6904.