Laboratory Directed Research and Development

The Laboratory Directed Research and Development Program provides the Department of Energy national laboratories with the opportunity and flexibility to establish and maintain an environment that encourages and supports creativity and innovation and contributes to their long-term viability. It is the principal mechanism through which the Department’s national laboratories can support the formulation of new theories, hypotheses, and approaches, build new and enhance existing S&T capabilities, and identify and develop technology applications with the potential to advance the DOE mission. Over the years, LDRD Programs and projects have realized major science and technology breakthroughs that have been reported widely in the scientific community. In addition, they have provided the laboratories with the opportunity to acquire foundational tools—to include S&T capabilities, as well as people—necessary to ensure their long-term viability.

A Pop Quiz for Cells 

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory scientists devise new imaging technique for biological sample analysis Read More >>

Safeguarding Nuclear Fuel Processing

Idaho National Laboratory Develops International Nonproliferation Safeguards for Commercial Pyroprocessing Facilities Read More >>

Prototype Detector and Chip Technology

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory develops effective capture for gamma ray signatures of astronomical events in our universe Read More >>

Storing Industry’s Carbon Dioxide in Real Time

PNNL researchers are developing new instruments that provide a first live look at industrial pollutants reacting with water and minerals Read More >>

A Promising Alternative to Traditional Photovoltaic Materials

NREL finds that random nanohole arrays become transparent conductors Read More >>

Protein Structures Through use of “Superbends” at the Advance Light Source

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory project designs unique bend magnets, enabling Nobel Prize winning science Read More >>

Preventing Blindness:

A Vision of Technology ORNL technology to scan millions for diabetic retinopathy traces roots to semiconductors Read More >>

Attenuating Diesel Engine Emissions

Early this decade, Argonne chemists developed a special catalyst that can reliably and economically remove more than 95% of NOx emissions from diesel engines Read More >>

Biogeochemical Controls

Savannah River National Laboratory researches long-term economic in-situ remediation of sites with mixed contaminants Read More >>

Improving Carbon Sequestration

PNNL employs microfluidics system to investigate sequestering carbon dioxide Read More >>

Differential Microwave Radiometer and the Cosmic Microwave Background

Then new-to-field LBNL physicist wins Nobel Prize for early “LDRD” project Read More >>