Voices of Research

Watch and meet researchers working on today’s most cutting-edge scientific challenges, and learn how their work makes a difference for you and future generations.

Fueling the Future

This series highlights research taking place at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRCs), a project that integrates the talents and expertise of leading scientists so they can revolutionize energy technologies in key areas such as energy storage, photoconversion and CO2 sequestration. EFRC successes will decisively enhance U.S. energy security, protect the global environment in the century ahead, and create a fundamentally new U.S. energy economy.

http://web.2.c2.audiovideoweb.com/va92web25028/Voices%20of%20Research/UMD_EFRC_GaryRubloff.flv

Making more powerful & longer lasting batteries

Gary Rubloff and researchers are working collaboratively through the DOE at the University of Maryland’s EFRC — Nanostructures of Electrical Energy Storage (NEES) — to greatly improve batteries by learning how the materials, lithium, and electrons interact at the nanometer scale (a nanometer is about one ten-thousandth of the diameter of a human hair), and to fabricate and measure these materials in a precise way. Their work could have a giant impact. Lighter weight, more powerful batteries could make long-range electric cars for storing massive amounts of energy from wind farms and solar panel arrays a reality rather than an inspiration.

http://web.2.c2.audiovideoweb.com/va92web25028/Voices%20of%20Research/Gunnoe_Short Cut.flv

Transforming methane into new energy sources

Dr. Brent Gunnoe and his team of researchers at the DOE Center for Catalytic Hydrocarbon Functionalization (CCHF) EFRC at the University of Virginia are pioneering ways to transform methane into new energy sources.

Scientific advances are needed to create new technologies that will provide large-scale access to alternative energy sources. At the core of nearly every large scale alternative resource is the need to selectively rearrange chemical bonds using sophisticated catalysts that can break and form chemical bonds. New catalytic technologies can lead to high impact technologies, but such catalysts require a level of molecular control beyond our current means. CCHF is focused on identifying catalysts that will allow the conversion of methane into liquid fuels. This work has the potential to greatly augment gasoline as a more environmentally friendly fuel.