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Biological Sciences

LATEST BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES NEWS

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 6-May-2025 12:09 ET (6-May-2025 16:09 GMT/UTC)

Taking stock of the known and unknown microbial space

DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Using publicly available genome sequence data generated over the past three decades, an analysis from researchers at the DOE Joint Genome Institute assesses what fraction of the microbial diversity we know about, and proposes a path forward to curate and cultivate what is still unknown.

Journal: Science Advances
Funder: DOE/US Department of Energy

Landmark photosynthesis gene discovery boosts plant height, advances crop science

DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A team of scientists with two Department of Energy Bioenergy Research Centers — the Center for Bioenergy Innovation, or CBI, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation, or CABBI, at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign — identified a gene in a poplar tree that enhances photosynthesis and can boost tree height by about 30% in the field and by as much as 200% in the greenhouse.

Journal: Developmental Cell
Funder: U.S. Department of Energy

How ‘clean’ does a quantum computing test facility need to be? PNNL scientists show the way

DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

How to keep stray radiation from “shorting” superconducting qubits; a pair of studies shows where ionizing radiation is lurking and how to banish it.

Journal: PRX Quantum
Funder: DOE/US Department of Energy

Plant CO2 uptake rises by nearly one third in new global estimates

DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Plants the world over are absorbing about 31% more carbon dioxide than previously thought, according to a new assessment developed by scientists. The research, detailed in the journal Nature, is expected to improve Earth system simulations that scientists use to predict the future climate, and spotlights the importance of natural carbon sequestration for greenhouse gas mitigation.

Journal: Nature
Funder: U.S. Department of Energy, Cornell University, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA Earth Science Technology Office, U.S. National Science Foundation

Flexible circuits made with silk and graphene on the horizon

DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Ultra-thin layers of silk deposited on graphene in perfect alignment represent a key advance for the control needed in microelectronics and advanced neural network development.

Journal: Science Advances
Funder: DOE/US Department of Energy

Three PNNL researchers receive DOE Early Career Research Awards

DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Grant and Award Announcement

Three PNNL researchers will receive five continuous years of funding for projects through highly competitive DOE Early Career Research Program awards.

Funder: DOE/US Department of Energy

Revealing the mysteries within microbial genomes

DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A new technique developed at Berkeley Lab will make it much easier for researchers to discover the traits or activities encoded by genes of unknown function in microbes, a key step toward understanding the roles and impact of individual species within the planet’s diverse microbiomes.

Journal: Nature Communications

Novel ultrafast electron microscopy technique advances understanding of processes applicable to brain-like computing

DOE/Argonne National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Argonne team developed a new microscopy technique that uses electrical pulses to track the nanosecond dynamics within a material that is known to form charge density waves. Controlling these waves may lead to faster and more energy-efficient electronics.

Journal: Physical Review Letters

Pioneering the cellular frontier

DOE/Brookhaven National Laboratory
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Scientists use a multimodal approach that combines hard X-ray computed tomography and X-ray fluorescence imaging to see the structure and chemical processes inside of a single cell.

Journal: Nature Communications

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