Berkeley Lab Press

“Do routine blood tests retain information about a person’s prior radiation exposure?” asks @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Jamie Inman. "Our findings suggest they could contribute to rapid exposure screening, although confirmatory testing is needed.”

“IceCube grew out of ideas developed in the early 1960s,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Spencer Klein -- who worked on IceCube alongside Francis Halzen starting in the 2000s. “It’s worked far better than we could ever have expected when we were getting started.”

"Gravity is probably discrete, measured like electromagnetism, but what else could happen is a shockingly difficult question to answer," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Daniel Carney.

"Leveraging our expertise in high-temperature fluid chemistry, we will sample and analyze well fluids and integrate results into simulation codes to evaluate thermochemical evolution and phase transitions during operation." says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Eva Schill.

"Looking forward to working with @PNNLab & @OregonState to analyze findings from the first three geothermal wells," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Eva Schill. "This will inform future drilling, including plans to reach record-setting temperatures above 400°C."

"Honored to see our autonomous materials science lab, or "A-Lab," featured atop this important story in @sciam on AI-driven research," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Gerd Ceder. "Autonomous labs are dramatically accelerating the pace of scientific discovery."

“Snow-eater heat waves are caused by the buildup of atypical high pressure," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Alan Rhoades. "Like a boulder diverting water in a stream, the unusual high pressure diverts storms away from mountains."

“The holy grail of particle physics is to search and find things that disagree with the Standard Model,” says 's Aaron Manalaysay. “And dark matter is one of those, and that motivates everyone.”

"Open-weight models are not just interesting for companies, from startups to large corporations; they are also critical to open and reproducible use of AI in scientific research,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov director Kathy Yelick.

“Snow-eater heat waves are caused by the buildup of atypical high pressure," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Alan Rhoades. "Like a boulder diverting water in a stream, the unusual high pressure diverts storms away from mountains."

“The discovery says we have something; compounds already existing today that can target and remove a double-strand break," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Cynthia McMurray. "If we reduce them, it may contribute to a cure for Huntington's disease.”

"Snow-eater heat waves have occurred often over the last few centuries; however, a particularly impactful one just occurred in March 2026," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Alan Rhoades.

"This is a major win in a larger effort to synthesize critical materials and battery materials using molten salts," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Mike Whitaker.

"In science, measurements are noisy, and predictions carry significant uncertainty," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Marcus Noack. "CAMERA is developing machine learning that accounts for uncertainty from the start—helping researchers make better decisions." #AI

“Someday future progress might enable more compact and efficient neutron generators, which have all kinds of applications, like cargo screening, planetary science, and medical therapy and imaging," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Arun Persaud. #fusion

“Speed makes people think differently,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Gerd Ceder. “When people get rapid answers, they stay engaged with things, and they tend to ask different questions."

"NVIDIA AI's Ising Calibration AI Model, which we're using @berkeleylab.lbl.gov, is at the forefront of integrating quantum and AI," says Bert de Jong. "It allows us to accelerate the continuous calibration of our quantum computers & improve their performance."

“This could be the most interesting discovery in cosmology since that of dark energy itself," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Nathalie Palanque-Delabrouille. @desisurvey.bsky.social

"The @desisurvey.bsky.social is still the leading instrument like it in the world," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's David Schlegel. It completed its initial 5-year survey and mapped 47 million galaxies and quasars. The experiment will continue observations into 2028.

Why the Energy Department's science labs will spearhead the federal push into AI / Science

“Next-generation batteries don’t have to rely on critical materials," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Robert Kostecki. "Disordered rock salt (DRX) Li-ion cathodes are cobalt-free, offer higher energy density, improved stability & enhanced safety."

“Dual-probe experiments at @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's BELLA Center have achieved unprecedented precision in inertial confinement fusion, which could help solve engineering challenges in developing fusion," says BELLA Research Scientist, Hai-En Tsai.

“FORUM-AI aims to be the first full-stack, agentic AI system for materials science research and discovery,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Anubhav Jain. “It will help scientists at every step of energy materials research.”

“Creation of a new element is an extremely rare feat. It’s exciting to be a part of the process and to have a promising path forward,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Jacklyn Gates.

“Nature holds a wealth of untapped natural products, and new tools in synthesis and synthetic biology are unlocking their potential for medicine, food, and fuels," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Nigel Mouncey.

"Newly tested desalination technologies are demonstrating great promise in meeting the challenges facing oil producing companies in Texas and New Mexico," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Peter Fiske. via @wsj.com

“Seeing these neutrino interactions is a pivotal milestone. It showcases LZ’s ability to detect signals of cosmic origin," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Dan Kodroff, LZ analysis co-lead.

"AI will increase the productivity of scientists," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Jonathan Carter. "The only debate is, by how much: Is it by a factor of 10 or 1,000?”

“This unprecedented simulation is a critical step forward to accelerate the design and development of quantum hardware. More powerful quantum chips will unlock new capabilities and open up new avenues in science,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Bert de Jong.

"Building superconducting qubits with over a microsecond lifetime is a heroic effort and establishes the solid foundations for next-generation superconducting quantum computing technology," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Bert de Jong.

“Industrial #biotech is not performing well either," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Deepti Tanjore. "We have overemphasized innovation at the microbial level, neglecting innovation in scale-up and distributed domestic manufacturing.” @rowanwalrath.bsky.social

"With AI, synthetic biology can become computationally driven, rather than intuition driven, where algorithms design DNA, enzymes, & entire biosynthetic pathways before they’re ever built," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Hector Garcia Martin.

"Big models are not the only way forward, " says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Bert de Jong. "Learning smarter and piece by piece is the path forward."

"Every breakthrough in science invites both excitement and scrutiny," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov 's Kristin Persson. "There is tremendous promise in applying data-driven AI and machine learning to the discovery, direction, and optimization of materials."

Thanks Yuval Boger, the Quantum Superposition Guy, for hosting me on your podcast discussing the future of quantum computing and the quantum research going on at the Quantum Systems Accelerator and @berkeleylab.lbl.gov podcast.yboger.com/2025/09/01/b...

“National labs bring together deep science, advanced engineering, and a culture of collaboration that’s essential at this stage of quantum’s development,” said @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Bert de Jong.

“Our goal was to make the best high-resolution, high-efficiency gamma-ray detector we possibly could, so we can answer big questions about the nature of matter and fundamental forces,” said @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Paul Fallon.

"From farms to cities, turning tough-to-treat water into a #CleanWater 🚰 supply could be life-changing. Proving it works in the real world is how we solve water scarcity for good," says Berkeley Lab's Peter Fiske. 💧🌱🌍🧪

"These new approaches to ocean desalination all utilize small, distributed, manufactured units, rather than a single large-scale custom-built facility, which cuts manufacturing costs and speed deployment of these systems," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov 's Peter Fiske.

"From high-performance magnets to advanced lasers & simulations, we're engaged with U.S. industry, like TAE, TypeOne Energy & Realta Fusion to develop technologies & insights to help unlock the potential of fusion energy" - @berkeleylab.lbl.gov’s Cameron Geddes.

The new supercomputer, which uses NVIDIA chips tailored for A.I. calculations, could be the Energy Department's biggest resource for tasks like training A.I. models, says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Jonathan Carter. @energygov.bsky.social

“We’re talking about two orders of magnitude more compute than any kind of academic data set that’s ever been made,” says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Sam Blau who worked with Meta on the project. “It’s going to dramatically change how people do computational chemistry.”

“Water is the ore body of the 21st century,” said @berkeleylab.lbl.gov’s Peter Fiske. “Technology now is allowing us to pick through the garbage piles of wastewater and pick out the high-value items.”

“That’s the beauty of being in a place like Berkeley Lab: If I have a question, I’ll go next door to ask someone, and in many cases, it’ll be a leading expert on the subject," said @berkeleylab.lbl.gov's Arian Gashi.

"One of the most promising new ways to treat produced water from oil & gas operations is with new membrane technology which transforms the wastewater into a usable resource for industrial reuse or agriculture," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov 's Peter Fiske. wsj.com/business/ene... via @wsj.com

"Not only will it provide sharper details of proteins and other molecules imaged with cryo-EM," says @berkeleylab.lbl.gov 's Peter Denes, "but it should enable microscopists to image even proteins roughly half the size of what is currently possible."

ALS-United: we speak with Steve Rossi (ALS Deputy for Business Operations), Daniela Leitner (Engineering Division Director, ALS-U System Lead for Removal & Installation), and Andrew Netto (ALS-U Deputy for Operations). @berkeleylab.lbl.gov als.lbl.gov/als-united-s...

Research by @berkeleylab.lbl.gov for @energygov.bsky.social shows that data centers' power consumption has tripled in the last ten years and may triple again by 2028.