Feature Articles

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

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Updates every hour. Last Updated: 21-Oct-2026 02:17 ET (21-Oct-2026 06:17 GMT/UTC)

Nuclear fusion: WEST beats the world record for plasma duration!

DOE/Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory

On 12 February, the CEA’s WEST machine was able to maintain a plasma for more than 22 minutes. In doing so, it smashed the previous record for plasma duration achieved with a tokamak. This leap forward demonstrates how our knowledge of plasmas and technological control of them over longer periods is becoming more mature, and offers hope that fusion plasmas can be stabilised for greater amounts of time in machines such as ITER.

INL’s enduring mission: How high-flux thermal irradiation testing became a foundation for US nuclear leadership

DOE/Idaho National Laboratory

Seventy-five years ago, the sweeping landscape of the Idaho desert over the Snake River Aquifer was a land of sagebrush, brown grass and lava rock. Today, the desert site facilities of Idaho National Laboratory are still home to sagebrush, brown grass and lava rock but also to of some of the world’s most cutting-edge nuclear fuel research and reactor prototype development.

Self-driving lab transforms materials discovery

DOE/Argonne National Laboratory

Researchers at Argonne National Laboratory have developed an AI-driven automated material laboratory, Polybot, an autonomous discovery platform that explores processing pathways to produce high-quality electronic polymer films with optimized conductivity and low-defect coatings, offering practical guidance for scalable production.

Journal: Nature Communications

Photographing DUNE

DOE/Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

Documenting the work of building the world’s largest neutrino experiment presents photographers with a unique set of challenges.

SandiaAI chat: New tool for creating efficiencies

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories

In May 2024, Sandia National Laboratories became the first facility within the nuclear security enterprise to provide its employees with access to this powerful new tool with SandiaAI Chat, enabling them to ask sensitive unclassified questions.

From innovation to industry: ORNL Researchers complete Energy I-Corps program

DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Nick Gregorich and Syed Islam, ORNL R&D staff, recently completed Cohort 19 of the Energy I-Corps program, an initiative of DOE’s Office of Technology Transitions, or OTT, that provides teams of researchers and industry mentors with an immersive two-month training to develop commercialization pathways for laboratory-developed technologies.

Employee-led giving at ORNL nets over $1.1M for area nonprofits, disaster relief in 2024

DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory

ORNL staff and its managing contractor, UT-Battelle, donated $1,104,866 in the 2024 ORNL Gives campaign, an annual employee-led effort to address needs throughout East Tennessee.

Argonne releases Aurora exascale supercomputer to researchers, enabling accelerated science

DOE/Argonne National Laboratory

With its Aurora exascale supercomputer, Argonne National Laboratory is providing researchers with a powerful tool to accelerate discoveries across many fields, including biology, chemistry and AI for science.

Mining the dark sky with the Aurora exascale supercomputer

DOE/Argonne National Laboratory

As part of the Aurora Early Science Program, an Argonne team is using the lab’s new Aurora exascale supercomputer and AI tools to perform simulations of the universe that aim to shed light on dark matter and dark energy.

Orchestrating the nanoscale: exploring light and matter for quantum science

DOE/Argonne National Laboratory

As part of the Q-NEXT quantum research center, Randall Goldsmith of the University of Wisconsin–Madison studies the interplay of light and matter, harnessing it for quantum information technologies.

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