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Materials

Science

When a Magnet Isn’t a Magnet

Using an application that took the 2009 Gordon Bell Prize as the world’s most advanced scientific computing application, a team led by ORNL’s Markus Eisenbach has been simulating the magnetic properties of promising materials, focusing in particular on the magnetocaloric effect. Its work is detailed in three recent papers in…
Leo Williams
December 2, 2011
Science

Packing the ions

Discovery boosts supercapacitor energy storage Computational modeling of carbon supercapacitors with the effects of surface curvature included.—Image credit: Jingsong Huang, ORNL Flat is in the eye of the beholder. When you’re talking about nanomaterials, however, that eye is pretty much useless unless it’s looking through an electron microscope or at…
Leo Williams
June 16, 2011
Science

Quantum Spin Doctors Dissect Exotic States of Matter

When German physicist Max Planck created quantum theory in 1900, he was not trying to revolutionize the world. He was just trying to provide a theoretical foundation for the way a heated object radiates energy and, thereby, to improve the efficiency of light bulbs. Modern scientists, too, cannot know which…
Leo Williams
May 14, 2008