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Environment

Through its partnerships with industry, government, and academia, NIST is helping to advance measurements and tools for environmental science, for example by calibrating the sensors of climate-mapping satellites and detecting ever more minute quantities of toxins and pollutants in our air, soil, water and blood.

The Research

Projects & Programs

Graphic of a globe where the land is light green and the water is light blue. In the Atlantic Ocean portion, there is a graphic overlay representing the breakdown of megaplastics to nanoplastics. Black text wraps around the globe. “Plastic Pollution Measurement Science” around the top, and “sources, transport, fate, quantities, impacts, repurposing” around the bottom

Plastic Pollution Measurement Science

Ongoing
Plastic pollution is a complex mixture of various types of plastics with different shapes and chemical additives. From microscopic nanoplastics (as small as 1 nm) to large megaplastics (over 1 m), plastic pollution poses significant measurement science challenges. By developing accurate methods for
Photo montage showing fill the airplane with fire-fighting foam, a spilled glass of wine on the tablecloth. Cleaning clothes and furniture from stains, Discarded Fast Food Wrappers Littered on Ground, wateproof jacket with water droplets on it. Jacket using the gore-tex technology.

Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS)

Ongoing
Perfluorinated and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS) constitute a family of compounds that are distinguished by partial or complete fluorination of alkyl hydrocarbons. Dubbed “forever chemicals”, the unique chemistry of PFAS imparts a high level of stability, making the compounds resistant to

Fundamental Guided Wave Metrology

Ongoing
The science of microwave measurements is expanding in many different directions. There is a constant push to use higher frequencies. Signals are becoming much more complex and include modulation effects, multiport/differential signals, complex waveforms, and other unusual signal schemes. On-wafer
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Additional Resources Links

Publications
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The NIST Biorepository

For 40 years, NIST has been involved in archiving biological and environmental specimens in its biorepository. The specimen range from human livers, marine sediments, and fish tissues to mussels, oysters, marine mammal tissues, bird eggs and feathers, and sea turtle tissues and eggs. This national biorepository, located at the Hollings Marine Laboratory in Charleston, S.C., is a unique resource that processes and preserves biospecimens at cryogenic temperatures (-150 °C), as well as the associated data, that are maintained through multiple partner projects. 

Learn more about the NIST Biorepository in this video.

News

NIST Charleston researchers Ashley Boggs-Russell (sitting) and Amanda Moors (standing) work with researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Marine Mammal Foundation to process tissue samples during veterinary assessments of wild bottlenose dolphins in the Gulf of Mexico following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. No dolphins were harmed in this process.

Tracking Hormones on Land and at Sea

It’s usually pretty straightforward to explain how my work on clinical measurements is a benefit to society, but sometimes I get confused looks when I tell people about my work on whales, alligators and fish, to name a few. At the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), I work on measurement science for endocrinology. Endocrinology is the science of hormones such as the commonly
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An upside down triangle with levels from top to bottom illustrating most preferable to least preferable: reduce, redesign, repair, reuse, mechanical recycling, waste to energy, waste.

NIST & ASTM International Publish Report Highlighting Standards Needs for Circular Textiles

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A newly built two-story home with an attached garage has solar panels on the roof.

A House Ahead of Its Time

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Square with rounded edges. Fill of square looks like American flag. Coming off the sides of the square are lines with unfilled circles at end. Words underneath: CHIPS for AMERICA

Biden-Harris Administration Opens $100 million Competition to Accelerate R&D and AI Technologies for Sustainable Semiconductor Materials

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