Few institutions can match the leading-edge experimental and computational capabilities and the supporting scientific expertise provided by the William R. Wiley Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory (EMSL), a DOE Scientific User Facility located at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in Richland, Washington. As a DOE Scientific User Facility, the capabilities of the EMSL are available to the general scientific and engineering communities to conduct research in the environmental molecular sciences and related areas in support of the needs of DOE and the nation. Specifically, the mission of the EMSL is to provide integrated experimental and computational resources for discovery and technological innovation in the environmental molecular sciences to support the needs of DOE and the nation.
The mission, vision and strategic goals for EMSL are outlined in the EMSL Strategic Plan. EMSL provides value to DOE and the nation by:
Potential users may submit a proposal for use of EMSL capabilities through the EMSL web page at any time; however, EMSL periodically issues focused calls for time allocation proposals. All proposals are reviewed for scientific merit, appropriateness of the requested capability, relevance to DOE’s missions and competence of the investigator(s).
To optimize the impact of EMSL’s user program, EMSL issues focused calls for proposals that are responsive to EMSL’s science themes: Biological Interactions and Dynamics, Geochemistry/Biogeochemistry and Subsurface Science, and Science of Interfacial Phenomena. The science themes are aligned with broad program areas within the DOE Office of Science and thereby with DOE’s missions. In addition, the science themes provide focus that encourages users to submit proposals that make use of multiple capabilities within EMSL to address a complex scientific problem. Finally, the science themes enable EMSL to focus its resources and future capital equipment investments in areas of research that will contribute scientific understanding to support DOE’s programs.
EMSL’s signature capabilities include a suite of high resolution nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectrometers, (ranging from 300 to 900 MHz), a suite of high performance mass spectrometers including an 11.5 Tesla mass spectrometer), and a high performance supercomputer (in transition to >160 TeraFlops) and associated visualization and data storage capabilities. The co-location of a robust spectrum of experimental capabilities with a high performance computer in a 200,000 ft2 building enables EMSL to provide users with the ability to integrate experimental and theoretical molecular-scale environmental studies in a problem-solving environment.
The EMSL problem-sovling environment enables Scientific Grand Challenge research efforts that contribute scientific understanding to help address DOE’s missions. Over the past two years, EMSL has been supporting two Scientific Grand Challenges. The purpose is to bring together groups of users to focus their research efforts for several years on important scientific challenges of interest to DOE, and to make significant use of the broad range of EMSL’s instrumentation and computational resources. The Membrane Biology Grand Challenge (MBGC) has been using a systems biology approach to determine the underlying network that governs the forms and functions of the membranes of a cyanobacterial species so that scientists can better understand the role of cyanobacteria in carbon sequestration and energy cycling. The Biogeochemistry Grand Challenge (BGC) focused on the mechanism by which electrons are transferred across the membrane of metal-reducing bacteria to iron and manganese oxides, a fundamental issue relevent to bioremediation of metal- and radionuclide-contaminated subsurface environments.
EMSL’s capabilities are organized into eight areas: 1) Deposition and Microfabrication, 2) Kinetics and Reaction, 3) Mass Spectrometry, 4) Microscopy, 5) NMR and EPR, 6) Spectroscopy and Diffraction, 7) Subsurface Flow and Transport, and 8) Supercomputing. While users often access the EMSL capabilities onsite, users can also operate some of the EMSL instrumentation remotely. For example, most of the NMR’s and the high performance computer can be operated or accesses remotely.
Although more than half of EMSL’s users were from academia during fiscal year 2008, approximately 40% of those users accessed multiple capabilities within EMSL. Users come to EMSL because there is no other user facility that provides so many complementary experimental resources, or both experimental and computational resources, in a single location.
Research highlights, facility information and user activities are described in a variety of EMSL publications. Every quarter, the quarterly highlights provide information regarding user research highlights, user and staff awards and recognition, facility and instrument upgrades, visitors to EMSL, and publications and presentations. The EMSL Newsletter is a periodic publication that provides topical information via a series of articles. Through the one-page News fliers, the scientific community receives breaking news and highlights from EMSL. Finally, the EMSL Annual Report provides an annual compilation of the research highlights, facility information and user activities by EMSL facility, along with a list of publications and presentations for the year.
The Climate and Environmental Sciences Division (CESD) within DOE’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research (BER), Office of Science, provides the operations and capital equipment funding for EMSL. The operations funding enables operation and maintenance of the facility and its research instrumentation and computational capabilities, and facility-wide infrastructure and user support staff. The capital equipment funding enables EMSL to maintain leading-edge experimental capabilities for users to conduct environmental molecular science research. Additional programmatic information about EMSL is available on the EMSL homepage.
October 2008