Berkeley Scientists Create Graphene Liquid Cells for Electron Microscopy Studies of Nanocrystal Formation
They won’t be coming soon to a multiplex near you, but movies showing the growth of platinum nanocrystals at the atomic-scale in real-time have blockbuster potential. A team of scientists with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California (UC) Berkeley has developed a technique for encapsulating liquids of nanocrystals between layers of graphene so that chemical reactions in the liquids can be imaged with an electron microscope. With this technique, movies can be made that provide unprecedented direct observations of physical, chemical and biological phenomena that take place in liquids on the nanometer scale. (more…)
*Berkeley Lab Researchers Embed Artificial Membranes with Billions of Nanoantennas for Enhanced Optical Studies*
At the heart of the immune system that protects our bodies from disease and foreign invaders is a vast and complex communications network involving millions of cells, sending and receiving chemical signals that can mean life or death. At the heart of this vast cellular signaling network are interactions between billions of proteins and other biomolecules. These interactions, in turn, are greatly influenced by the spatial patterning of signaling and receptor molecules. The ability to observe signaling spatial patterns in the immune and other cellular systems as they evolve, and to study the impact on molecular interactions and, ultimately, cellular communication, would be a critical tool in the fight against immunological and other disorders that lead to a broad range of health problems including cancer. Such a tool is now at hand. (more…)
*Berkeley Lab Researchers Show the Way Forward for Improving Organic and Molecular Electronic Devices*
Future prospects for superior new organic electronic devices are brighter now thanks to a new study by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). Working at the Lab’s Molecular Foundry, a DOE nanoscience center, the team has provided the first experimental determination of the pathways by which electrical charge is transported from molecule-to-molecule in an organic thin film. Their results also show how such organic films can be chemically modified to improve conductance.
“We have shown that when the molecules in organic thin films are aligned in particular directions, there is much better conductance,” says Miquel Salmeron, a leading authority on nanoscale surface imaging who directs Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division and who led this study. “Chemists already know how to fabricate organic thin films in a way that can achieve such an alignment, which means they should be able to use the information provided by our methodology to determine the molecular alignment and its role on charge transport across and along the molecules. This will help improve the performances of future organic electronic devices.” (more…)
*JBEI Researchers Develop a New Candidate for a Cleaner, Greener and Renewable Diesel Fuel*
A class of chemical compounds best known today for fragrance and flavor may one day provide the clean, green and renewable fuel with which truck and auto drivers fill their tanks. Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) have engineered Escherichia coli (E. coli) bacteria to generate significant quantities of methyl ketone compounds from glucose. In subsequent tests, these methyl ketones yielded high cetane numbers – a diesel fuel rating comparable to the octane number for gasoline – making them strong candidates for the production of advanced biofuels.
“Our findings add to the list of naturally occurring chemical compounds that could serve as biofuels, which means more flexibility and options for the biofuels industry,” says Harry Beller, a JBEI microbiologist who led this study. “We’re especially encouraged by our finding that it is possible to increase the methyl ketone titer production of E. coli more than 4,000-fold with a relatively small number of genetic modifications.” (more…)
