Department
U.S. Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu visited Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) on Friday, June 3.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC— Scientists have long debated about the origin of carbon in Earth’s oldest sedimentary rocks and how it might signal the remnants of the earliest forms of life on the planet.
Mineralogy
Washington, DC, 14 April 2011- How amino acids attach to mineral surfaces is important for understanding bioadhesion, biomineralization, solar cell development and the origin of life. A study by Geophysical Laboratory scientists sheds new light on this important interaction.
High Pressure
Washington, DC — Although its name may make many people think of flowers, the element germanium is part of a frequently studied group of elements, called IVa, which could have applications for next-generation computer architecture as well as implications for fundamental condensed matter physics. New research conducted by Xiao-Jia Chen, Viktor Struzhkin, and Ho-kwang (Dave) Mao from Geophysical Laboratory at Carnegie Institution for Science, along with collaborators from China, reveals details of the element’s transitions under pressure. Their results show extraordinary agreement with the predictions of modern condensed matter theory.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC—Formaldehyde, a poison and a common molecule throughout the universe, is likely the source of the solar system’s organic carbon solids—abundant in both comets and asteroids.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC— In the 1950s, biochemist Stanley Miller performed a series of experiments to demonstrate that organic compounds could be created under conditions mimicking the primordial Earth.
Department
Washington, DC—The U.S. Patent & Trademark Office has issued a patent to the Carnegie Institution for a method of creating high quality diamond crystals larger than 10 carats.
High Pressure
Washington, DC—Chemical compounds called manganites have been studied for many years since the discovery of colossal magnetoresistance, a property that promises important applications in the fields of magnetic sensors, magnetic random access memories and spintronic devices.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC—Surprising new research shows that, contrary to conventional belief, remains of chitin-protein complex—structural materials containing protein and polysaccharide—are present in abundance in fossils of arthropods from the Paleozoic era.
In the 1950s, biochemist Stanley Miller performed a series of experiments to demonstrate that organic compounds could be created under conditions mimicking the primordial Earth.
High Pressure
Video Press Release
Geochemistry
Washington, DC, 1 January 2011-This is an image of organic carbon in a ordinary chondritic meteorite obtained using a scanning transmission X-ray microscope at the Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory.
Planetary Science
Video Press Release
High Pressure
Washington, DC, 14 December 2010- Materials can take on surprising shapes under pressure.
Department
Washington, DC—A group at the Geophysical Laboratory (GL) and the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism (DTM), who share the Broad Branch Road (BBR) campus in Washington, have been recognized by So Others Might Eat (SOME) for serving the “hungry and homeless of Washington for over 20 years.”
High Pressure
Washington, DC, 28 October 2010- Lasers are used extensively for exploring the nature of materials under extreme conditions, including high pressures and temperatures.
Department
Washington, DC—Carnegie biogeochemist Marilyn Fogel, developmental biologist Marnie Halpern, and astronomer Stella Kafka were selected from over 500 applicants to be USA Science & Engineering Festival “Nifty Fifty” lecturers.
Geochemistry
Argonne, ILL—For the first time scientists have been able to watch nanoparticles grow from the earliest stages of their formation. Nanoparticles are the foundation of nanotechnology and their performance depends on their structure, composition, and size.
High Pressure
Washington, DC, 18 August 2010- Researchers from the University of Michigan and the Geophysical Laboratory have demonstrated a new method for quantitatively measuring the degree of pressure-induced atomic disordering in pyrochlore oxides using synchrotron x-ray diffraction, synchrotron infrared spectroscopy and Raman scattering techniques. 
Planetary Science
Washington, DC— Up to now scientists thought that the trace amounts of carbon on the surface of the Moon came from the solar wind. Now researchers at the Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory have detected and dated Moon carbon in the form of graphite—the sooty stuff of pencil lead—which survived from the late heavy bombardment era 3.8 billion years ago.
Planetary Science
Washington, DC—Scientists at the Carnegie Institution’s Geophysical Laboratory, with colleagues, have discovered a much higher water content in the Moon’s interior than previous studies.
Department
Yoko Imai, a Japanese artist based in Paris, has developed unique calligraphy based on mixing pearl ink with small quantities of diamond synthesized at the Geophysical Laboratory.
Astrobiology
Washington, DC — The evolution of complex life forms may have gotten a jump start billions of years ago, when geologic events operating over millions of years caused large quantities of phosphorus to wash into the oceans.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC—An unprecedented study of bald eagle diet, from about 20,000 to 30,000 years ago to the present, will provide wildlife managers with unique information for reintroducing Bald Eagles to the Channel Islands off California.
High Pressure
Washington, DC, 15 April 2010- Single-crystal relaxor ferroelectrics are useful and fascinating systems, but understanding the inner workings of these complex materials has been very challenging. They have spatial and temporal heterogeneities over a range of length and time scales.
High Pressure
Washington, DC, 1 April 2010- Nanoscience is opening up a new window on materials under extreme conditions.
High Pressure
Metallic glasses are emerging as potentially useful materials at the frontier of materials science research. They combine the advantages and avoid many of the problems of normal metals and glasses, two classes of materials with a very wide range of applications.
Department
Washington, DC— Carnegie scientists Kenneth Caldeira of the Department of Global Ecology, Yingwei Fei of the Geophysical Laboratory, and Steven Shirey of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism have been elected 2010 Fellows of the American Geophysical Union (AGU).
High Pressure
Washington, DC—Physicists have long wondered whether hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, could be transformed into a metal and possibly even a superconductor—the elusive state in which electrons can flow without resistance.
High Pressure
Single-crystal diamonds produced at the Geophysical Laboratory are traveling with a major museum exhibit called the Nature of Diamonds. The display focuses on the beauty of diamonds, their geological origins, and the science of diamond.
High Pressure
  Scientists at the Carnegie Institution have found for the first time that high pressure can be used to make a unique hydrogen-storage material.
Geochemistry
Washington, DC— Much of our planet’s mineral wealth was deposited billions of years ago when Earth’s chemical cycles were different from today’s.
Geochemistry
Washington DC, Dust samples collected by high-flying aircraft in the upper atmosphere have yielded an unexpectedly rich trove of relicts from the ancient cosmos, report scientists from the Carnegie Institution.
High Pressure
Washington, DC—The oil and gas that fuels our homes and cars started out as living organisms that died, were compressed, and heated under heavy layers of sediments in the Earth’s crust.
Department
Washington, DC— The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation has awarded the Carnegie Institution a $4 million grant over three years to initiate the Deep Carbon Observatory -- an international, decade-long project to investigate the nature of carbon in Earth's deep interior.
High Pressure
Argonne, IL—Millions of people today carry around pocket-sized music players capable of holding thousands of songs, thanks to the discovery 20 years ago of a phenomenon known as the “giant magnetoresistance effect,” which made it possible to pack more data onto smaller and smaller hard drives.
Mineralogy
Washington, DC— The Earth’s original atmosphere held very little oxygen.
Washington, DC—The car-sized asteroid that exploded above the Nubian Desert last October was small compared to the dinosaur-killing, civilization-ending objects that still orbit the sun.
Washington, DC— An international team of researchers including scientists at the Carnegie Institution has discovered a new chemical compound that consists of a single element―boron.

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