NIST Stickers

Bose-Einstein Condensate

This image is a computer simulation showing tornado-like vortices forming within a spinning Bose-Einstein condensate. BEC's are a state of matter in which a collection of atoms behaves like one uniform "superatom." This NIST simulation helped confirm that BEC's are superfluids — a kind of liquid/gas that flows without friction.

• Physicists Create New State of Matter at Record Low Temperature (July 13, 1995)
• Bose-Einstein Condensate: A New Form of Matter (October 9, 2001)
• Eric Cornell and the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics

Quantum Measurement Tools

Want to take a snapshot of a single atom or measure the force required to pull an atom across a surface? How about a map of extremely small hills and valleys on a material’s surface? Maybe you want to record the way current flows across an atom-thin material? Our atomic Swiss Army Knife can make all three of these measurements at the same time on scales ranging from nanometers to millimeters. The simultaneous nature of the tool makes it invaluable for understanding the atomic origins of strange properties in materials that we want to harness for quantum computing.

NIST researchers used the graphene device shown here to test out nanoscale measurements of the instrument they built, recording the way current flows across the atom-thin material in the presence of a magnetic field.

Automotive Lightweighting

Here’s a crash course in today’s automotive industry: More gadgets for a better driving experience (smart radios, heated seating, etc.) all make for more weight on the car and less fuel efficiency. To lighten the load, manufacturers are exploring thinner metals for car parts, but those alternatives need to still offer the same strength for the safety of the vehicle’s occupants.

Researchers at the NIST Center for Automotive Lightweighting regularly test new alloys. This electron backscatter diffraction image produced by NIST postdoctoral researcher Jake Benzing shows the properties of each metallic grain at the microscale when a particular new alloy was formed with a treatment at a relatively low temperature for half an hour.
 

Forensic DNA Analysis

NIST has played a key role in the historical development of forensic DNA analysis. Today, our forensic science program conducts research to advance forensic DNA methods, including laying the groundwork for using next generation DNA sequencing for human identification, and develops physical reference standards that DNA labs across the country and the world use to help ensure reliable results.

• DNA Mixtures: A Forensic Science Explainer
• The Organization of Scientific Area Committees for Forensic Science

Fire Science

Fire testing at NIST has been a staple of the agency’s research since the early 1900s. This image shows a structural steel beam being exposed to an open flame. The purple-blue hue is caused by high-intensity, near-ultraviolet lighting used to illuminate the beam through the flames. This experiment and many more were conducted at the National Fire Research Laboratory on the NIST campus in Gaithersburg, Maryland. It is one of the world’s largest indoor fire testing facilities.

• 50 Years of Fire Safety Advances
• Built to House an Inferno
• In the Eye of the Fire
• Trial By Fire: A Look at NIST Fire Testing Through the Years

Digital Library of Mathematical Functions

NIST's Digital Library of Mathematical Functions (DLMF) was launched online in 2010. The DLMF provides critical reference information needed to use applied mathematics "special functions" in practice, such as their precise definitions, alternative ways to represent them mathematically, illustrations of how the functions behave at extreme values, and their relationships to other functions and concepts. (Read the press release about 2010 launch.)

Pictured here is the density plot of the modulus of an elliptic umbilic canonical integral function.

• DLMF home
• Visualizations of Canonical Integrals
• NIST Digital Library of Mathematical Functions Receives IT Award (October 25, 2011)

Digital Library of Mathematical Functions

NIST's Digital Library of Mathematical Functions (DLMF) was launched online in 2010. The DLMF provides critical reference information needed to use applied mathematics "special functions" in practice, such as their precise definitions, alternative ways to represent them mathematically, illustrations of how the functions behave at extreme values, and their relationships to other functions and concepts. (Read the press release about 2010 launch.)

Pictured here is the density plot of a phase of an elliptic umbilic canonical integral function.

• DLMF home
• Visualizations of Canonical Integrals
• NIST Digital Library of Mathematical Functions Receives IT Award (October 25, 2011)

Digital Library of Mathematical Functions

NIST's Digital Library of Mathematical Functions (DLMF) was launched online in 2010. The DLMF provides critical reference information needed to use applied mathematics "special functions" in practice, such as their precise definitions, alternative ways to represent them mathematically, illustrations of how the functions behave at extreme values, and their relationships to other functions and concepts. (Read the press release about 2010 launch.)

Pictured here is is a two-phase solution of the Kadomtsev-Petviashvili equation.

• DLMF home
• Multidimensional Theta Functions
• NIST Digital Library of Mathematical Functions Receives IT Award (October 25, 2011)

Carbon Nanotubes

This image is a 3D volume reconstruction of a forest of carbon nanotubes (CNT) embedded in epoxy created by Bharath Natarajan, a NIST Associate from Georgetown University. The transmission electron microscopy (TEM) sample was prepared by focusing ion beam (FIB) milling and imaged using electron tomography. The tilt series was reconstructed and then processed with in-house software to identify CNT bundles and color them based on their size. This bundling information is key to understanding the network properties as well the axial mechanical properties of these composites.

• Natarajan Wins FEI Image Award

Tantula

In work that could make it easier to combine optical components on a chip for applications such as data communication, quantum information, and precision measurement, NIST researchers showed that a thin layer of tantalum pentoxide (tantula) on a silicon wafer can convert a low-energy, ultrafast pulse of light into a very wide range, or supercontinuum, of colors (wavelengths) in the near-infrared (near-IR) part of the spectrum.

This image depicts the spectrum of near-IR wavelengths that are generated.

Quantum Wavefunctions

This sticker is a visual depiction of a quantum wavefunction of an atom.  

Solar Panels

Solar panels face attack on all sides, so NIST researchers are coming to their defense and studying the causes of failures. Shown here are carbon-coated samples of solar panel backsheets that are ready for analysis with scanning electron microscopy. 

Exposure to the elements can make the material used on the backside of solar panels brittle and prone to cracking, which can also damage the electrical components inside. In the lab, NIST postdoctoral researcher Stephanie Moffitt runs these materials through an accelerated aging process so that she can compare changes at different stages 5-30 years down the line. Then, she analyzes the chemical processes and properties behind the sodium leakages and backsheet cracking in order to determine exactly how the failures happen.

Artificial Intelligence

This sticker represents NIST's multitude of research in the artificial intelligence space.

• Overview of NIST's artificial intelligence research/work
• AI Risk Management Framework (AI RMF)
• Trustworthy and Responsible AI Resource Center
• National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee (NAIAC)

Phishing

This sticker represents NIST's ongoing research into phishing and cybersecurity, and the creation of a phish scale, which is intended to help provide a deeper understanding of whether a particular phishing email is harder or easier for a particular target audience to detect.

• The Phish Scale: NIST-Developed Method Helps IT Staff See Why Users Click on Fraudulent Emails (Sept 17, 2020)
• You’ve Been Phished! (June 27, 2018)