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Lab Nobelist's Moon Dust Reappears After 44 Years
 Berkeley Lab archivist Karen Nelson uncovered moon dust-about 20 vials with handwritten labels and dated "24 July 1970"-last month while reviewing and clearing out artifacts from the Lab's warehouse. Along with the jar was a copy of the paper "Study of Carbon Compounds in Apollo 11 and Apollo 12 Returned Lunar Samples," published in 1971. Among the five co-authors is Melvin Calvin, who was also an associate director of Berkeley Lab and 1961 winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. More> |
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Researchers Discuss Their 'Big Ideas' at Recent Berkeley Rep Talk
If you missed this recent "Science at the Theater" talk, not to worry. Watch a video of the fast-paced discussion, during which some of the Lab's leading researchers each had eight minutes to discuss game-changing concepts, including cancer, Alzheimer's, dark energy, big data, biofuels, microbes, and new materials. |
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Climate Change to Shift Boreal Forests North
 It's difficult to imagine how a degree or two of warming will affect a location. Will it rain less? What will happen to the area's vegetation? New research by Charles Koven offers a way to envision a warmer future. It maps how Earth's myriad climates - and the ecosystems that depend on them - will move from one area to another as global temperatures rise. The approach foresees big changes for boreal forests, which will likely shift north at a steady clip this century. Along the way, the vegetation will relinquish more trapped carbon than most current climate models predict. More>
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ABC 7 TV Profiles Lab Efforts to Create Alternative Fuels
 [KGO] Today's higher gas prices can really pinch the monthly budget. But what if there was a cheaper alternative that could be produced on the scale of oil and be better for the environment? That's just what Berkeley Lab's Joint BioEnergy Institute in Emeryville is working on. More>
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Polar Bears, Freezing Equipment Among Scientist's Arctic Research Challenges
 Last October, when Susan Hubbard and her team pulled sleds full of sensitive sensors across the snow near the northernmost point in Alaska, temperatures hovered in the single digits and low teens (e.g., 8-15 °F). Foremost in the researchers' minds, aside from collecting data on the frozen ground beneath their feet, were two things: keep an eye out for polar bears and keep their equipment from freezing. Hubbard, an earth scientist at Berkeley Lab, had hired a polar bear guard to deal with the first problem and perfected the art of wrapping pieces of equipment up and periodically warming them in heated huts to deal with the second. More>
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Mathematics of Popping Bubbles in Foam
 Bubble baths and soapy dishwater, the refreshing head on a beer and the luscious froth on a cappuccino. All are foams, beautiful yet ephemeral as the bubbles pop one by one. Now, two researchers from Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley have described mathematically the successive stages in the complex evolution and disappearance of foamy bubbles, a feat that could help in modeling industrial processes in which liquids mix or in the formation of solid foams such as those used to cushion bicycle helmets. More>
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Walk or Run? Flip-Flop Advice on Exercise May Not be as Contradictory as it Seems
 [Slate] If you're a runner, you might have noticed this surprising headline from a recent edition of the Guardian: "Brisk walk healthier than running -scientists." Or maybe you saw this one, which ran in Health magazine the same day: "Want to lose weight? Then run, don't walk: Study." Dueling research from rival academic camps? Not exactly. Both articles described the work of a herpetologist-turned-statistician at Berkeley Lab named Paul Williams, who, last month, achieved a feat that's exceedingly rare in mainstream science: He used exactly the same dataset to publish two opposing findings. More>
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Check Out Science Talks at Actual Cafe in Oakland
 What is the science behind such activities as photography, surfing and baseball? Stop by the Actual Cafe in Oakland (corner of San Pablo and Alcatraz) to find out, part of the "Actual Science" series that features Berkeley Lab materials scientists. The Thursday talks are scheduled for May 30, June 27, and July 25.
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Photo of Lab's Advanced Light Source Featured on Colbert Report
 On a recent episode of the popular Comedy Central show The Colbert Report, host Stephen Colbert starts the program by saying: "The day I long warned you about has finally arrived...not the one where my death ray is completed." Then up pops a doctored photo showing the interior of Advanced Light Source along with a lab-coated Colbert and his "death ray" machine. He adds that his machine won't be ready for another six months...but we have been warned!! Liz Moxon of the ALS guesses the photo was taken around 2004. Click here to watch the program. The ALS photo shows up at around 1:30 on the video. More>
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| The Lab's Mechanical Fabrication Facility
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| Video Glossary |
Hear Lab researchers define scientific terms in lay language.
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