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Chemistry

Molecular characterization

News and Updates

Blog Posts

Brad Sutliff wears safety glasses as he stands in the lab in front of a computer monitor.

From Trash to Cash: How AI and Machine Learning Can Help Make Recycling Less Expensive for Local Governments

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Historical photo shows Henry Moseley sitting at a desk reading a thick book, with other open books on the desk.

Henry Moseley: A Patriotic Scientist Who Changed the Periodic Table — and Then Went Off to War

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A small orange is packaged in a plastic container with a lid.

A Polymer Scientist Wrestles — Literally and Figuratively — With the Frustrations of Plastic Packaging

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Events

Projects and Programs

Breathalyzer

Standards Development to Ensure Reliable Breath Analysis in the Field

Ongoing
Numerous volatile organic compounds (VOCs) have been identified in human breath. These compounds can be produced by the body or by organisms in the body (e.g., bacteria or viruses) and provide a non-invasive window into human health. Inexpensive point-of-care devices are being developed to diagnose

NCNR DAC and CCUS efforts

Ongoing
Objectives To advance US competitiveness in Direct Air Capture (DAC) and Carbon Capture, Usage, and Sequestration (CCUS) Use advanced neutron scattering techniques to understand the adsorption process for the most promising materials for adsorption-based carbon capture and provide avenues to

Macromolecular Architectures

Ongoing
This project’s purpose is to synthesize and characterize model thermoplastics, thermoplastic elastomers (TPE), and mixed resins with systematic variation of polymer sequence, chemistry, and architectures to generate libraries of quantitative structure-property relationships validated by multiple
Cannabis

NIST Tools for Cannabis Laboratory Quality Assurance

Ongoing
Since the 1970s, cannabis (marijuana and hemp) and its constituent, Δ 9-tetrahydrocannabinol or THC, have been classified as Schedule I controlled substances. Seized evidence is tested by forensic laboratories, which verify the identity of the plant through macro- and microscopic evaluation and the

Publications

Glass microwave microfluidic devices for broadband characterization of diverse fluids

Author(s)
Jacob Pawlik, Tomasz Karpisz, Yasaman Kazemipour, Nicholas Derimow, Sarah Evans, Bryan Bosworth, Christian Long, Nathan Orloff, James Booth, Angela Stelson
We demonstrate a glass microwave microfluidic device for determining the permittivity of a wide range of liquid chemicals from 100 MHz to 10 GHz with relatively

Correlating Near-Infrared Spectra to Bulk Properties in Polyolefins

Author(s)
Bradley Sutliff, Shailja Goyal, Tyler Martin, Peter Beaucage, Debra Audus, Sara Orski
The industry standard for sorting plastic wastes is near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopy, which offers rapid and nondestructive identification of various plastics

Tools and Instruments