SLAC topics

Chemistry and catalysis RSS feed

Catalysts are the unsung heroes of chemistry, accelerating reactions used to make fertilizers, fuels and consumer products. Our work aims to make catalysts more efficient and reduce the use of fossil fuels.

Energy sciences

Depiction of four techniques used to study a single-atom catalyst.

News Feature

New research offers the first complete picture of why a promising approach of stuffing more lithium into battery cathodes leads to their failure. A...

high capacity batteries
News Feature

Detailed observations of iridium atoms at work could help make catalysts that drive chemical reactions smaller, cheaper and more efficient.

Depiction of four techniques used to study a single-atom catalyst
News Feature

New research will help in the quest to design low-cost drugs that can tackle postpartum bleeding and other conditions without severe side effects.

Misoprostol and EP3 receptor
News Feature

Researchers mapped trace elements within Pleistocene fossils to learn about the life of a long-extinct subspecies of spotted hyena.

Spotted hyena
Press Release

In a major step forward, SLAC’s X-ray laser captures all four stable states of the process that produces the oxygen we breathe, as well...

Atomic movie
News Feature

A new study is a step forward in understanding why perovskite materials work so well in energy devices and potentially leads the way toward...

Scattered neutrons off perovskite material.
News Feature

This summer, five graduate students from the University of Puerto Rico had the opportunity to use SLAC’s world-class facilities to keep their studies on...

University of Puerto Rico Interns
News Feature

A SLAC-Stanford study reveals exactly what it takes for diamond to crystallize around a “seed” cluster of atoms. The results apply to industrial processes...

Illustration of diamondoid and diamond crystals
News Feature

Tony Heinz and Z-X Shen will receive funding for research focused on catalysis and novel states of matter.

Press Release

To break, or not to break: An unprecedented atomic movie captures the moment when molecules decide how to respond to light.

UED Bond Breaking
News Feature

Experiments at SLAC heated water from room temperature to 100,000 degrees Celsius in less than a millionth of a millionth of a second, producing...

Illustration of water molecules hit by X-ray laser
News Feature

The professor at University of California, Davis, describes his innovative work at SLAC’s synchrotron to search for simple, selective catalysts.

Portrait of Bruce Gates