A U.S. Department of Energy laboratory operated by Iowa State University

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY AT THE AMES LABORATORY

S P R I N G

Ames Laboratory Shaping Science for 60 Years
F E AT U R E S

4 Visible Improvement Ames Lab researchers help push the left-handed envelope.

5 The Great Zinc Rethink Researchers tune zinc to imitate other materials. 

6 Ames Lab 60th Anniversary Highlights of Ames Laboratory’s research achievements from 

 the past 60 years.

8 “Quite an Honor”

Karl Gschneidner is named to the 

 National Academy of Engineering.

9 Removing a Hydrogen Roadblock A palladium substitute could make hydrogen fuel-cell

 technology effective.

10 Sim City Ames Lab adds a new program — Simulation, 

 Modeling and Decision Science.

D E PA R T M E N T S

3 Director’s Letter

11 Education

Ames Laboratory is a U.S. Department of 

Energy laboratory seeking solutions to energy-related problems through the exploration of chemical, engineering, materials 

and mathematical sciences, and physics. 

Established in the 1940s with the successful development of the most efficient 

process to produce high-purity uranium 

metal for atomic energy, Ames Lab now 

pursues much broader priorities than the 

materials research that has given the Lab 

international credibility. Responding to issues of national concern, Ames Laboratory 

scientists are actively involved in innovative 

research, science education programs, the 

development of applied technologies and 

the quick transfer of such technologies 

to industry. Uniquely integrated within a 

university environment, the Lab stimulates 

creative thought and encourages scientific 

discovery, providing solutions to complex 

problems and educating tomorrow’s 

scientific talent.

Steve Karsjen, Editor

Kerry Gibson, Managing Editor

Saren Johnston and Breehan 

Gerleman, Contributing Editors

Grant Luhmann, Art Director

Anna Hanson, Graphics Intern

Copyright 2007 by Ames Laboratory. All 

rights reserved. For additional information 

about Ames Laboratory or topics covered 

in this publication, please contact: 

Editor, Inquiry

Ames Laboratory

111 TASF

Ames, Iowa 50011-3020

515-294-9557

www.ameslab.gov

Inquiry is published biannually by the 

Ames Laboratory Office of Public Affairs. 

Iowa State University operates the Laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy 

under contract DE AC02 07CH11358. 

Located on the ISU campus, the Ames 

Laboratory is a member of the university’s 

Institute for Physical Research and Technology, a network of scientific research 

centers.

Cover: With origins in the Manhattan Project, Ames Laboratory 

has been shaping science for 60 years. 

Contents

9

6

10
INQUIRY SPRING 2007 3

elcome to the new, spring issue of Inquiry, a publication highlighting the research achievements of Ames 

Laboratory, a U.S. Department of Energy research 

facility operated by Iowa State University. In an effort to 

keep our audiences better informed, Inquiry will now be 

published twice a year instead of just once.

It’s just one of many changes taking place at the Laboratory. As I write 

this letter, a nationwide search has begun to replace Dr. Tom Barton as 

director, and we look forward to having his permanent replacement in 

position by late summer. Dr. Barton led the Ames Laboratory for 18 years 

and leaves behind a commitment to excellence that not only has helped 

the Laboratory strengthen its status as a world leader in materials research but also has helped 

expand the Lab’s research mission to address new energy-related challenges in materials, chemical, engineering and mathematical sciences, and physics.

Two other major events are impacting the Ames Laboratory in 2007. One is the 60th anniversary of the Laboratory, which we began celebrating on May 17, and that history is celebrated on 

the cover and the center spread. 

The second major announcement is the signing of a new contract between the Department 

of Energy and Iowa State University for the continued operation of the Ames Laboratory. ISU has 

been the sole contractor for Ames Lab for the DOE since the Lab’s inception in 1947. The new 

contract, which took effect on Jan. 1, 2007, is a five-year contract worth $150 million. But there 

are opportunities to extend the contract for up to 20 years based on outstanding performance in 

our scientific programs. We are confident this extension will be realized. 

As exemplified by the research stories in this issue, we have a strong commitment to leadingedge research that responds to the DOE’s energy mission. Senior physicist Costas Soukoulis remains a leader in the emerging field of metamaterials. Senior physicist Paul Canfield and scientist 

Sergey Bud’ko have discovered a family of zinc alloys that can be tuned to take on properties of 

other materials. And materials scientist Alan Russell and Material Preparation Center Director Larry 

Jones are using their collective know-how to help develop a cost-effective substitute for palladium 

to help make hydrogen-fuel technology a reality. The Laboratory remains committed to helping 

bring appropriate technology advancements to the marketplace to the benefit of the American 

taxpayer.

In addition, our commitment also extends to doing our part to educate the next generation of 

scientists and engineers through our symbiotic relationship with our contractor, Iowa State University. As one might imagine, our commitment to quality education and training pays off handsomely 

for the DOE and our nation through the entrance of a diverse, exceptionally well-trained cadre of 

scientists and engineers into the labor pool.

Although my time as director of the Ames Laboratory is scheduled to be short, I can assure you 

that while I’m here our commitment to high-quality research will not wane in the slightest. And I 

think it goes without saying that our new director will share that commitment as he or she envisions ways in which the Ames Laboratory can grow and prosper in the next 60 years. 

 

W

From the Director

Alan Goldman, Interim Director 
Improvement

Pushing the left-handed envelope

OR THE FIRST TIME EVER,

researchers at Ames 

Laboratory have developed 

a material with a negative 

refractive index for visible 

light. Ames Laboratory senior physicist Costas Soukoulis, working with 

colleagues in Karlsruhe, Germany, 

designed a silver-based, mesh-like 

material that marks the latest advance in the rapidly evolving field of 

metamaterials.

The advance, detailed in the Jan. 

5 issue of Science, the Jan. 1 issue of 

Optic Letters and noted in the journal 

Nature, marks a significant step forward from the existing metamaterials 

that operate in the microwave or far 

infrared – but still invisible – regions 

of the spectrum.

Metamaterials, also known as lefthanded materials, are exotic, artificially created materials that provide 

optical properties not found in natural 

F materials. Natural materials refract 

light, or electromagnetic radiation, to 

the right of the incident beam at different angles and speeds. However, 

metamaterials make it possible to 

refract light to the left, or at a negative 

angle. This backward-bending characteristic provides scientists the ability 

to control light, which opens a wide 

range of potential applications.

“Left-handed materials may one 

day lead to the development of a 

type of flat superlens that operates in 

the visible spectrum,” says Soukoulis, 

who is also an Iowa State University 

Distinguished Professor of Liberal 

Arts and Sciences. “Such a lens 

would offer superior resolution over 

conventional technology, capturing details much smaller than one 

wavelength of light to vastly improve 

imaging for materials or biomedical 

applications,” such as giving researchers the power to see inside a human 

BY KERRY GIBSON

4 INQUIRY 2007

For more information:

Costas Soukoulis, (515) 294-2816

soukoulis@ameslab.gov

Research funded by:

DOE Basic Energy Sciences,

Materials Science and Engineering Division

(left) Multilayer processing is used to fabricate metamaterials in a net-like structure that produces negative refraction 

in several directions. (below) A micrograph shows details of 

the fishnet material.

A cell or diagnose disease in a baby 

still in the womb.

The challenge that Soukoulis and 

other scientists who work with metamaterials face is to fabricate them so 

that they refract light at ever smaller 

wavelengths. The “fishnet” design developed by Soukoulis and produced 

by nanostructure researchers Stefan 

Linden and Martin Wegener at the 

University of Karlsruhe has openings 

roughly 100 nanometers wide.

“We have fabricated for the first 

time a negative-index metamaterial with a refractive index of -0.6 at 

the red end of the visible spectrum 

(wavelength 780 nm),” says Soukoulis. “This is the smallest wavelength 

obtained so far.”

While the silver used in the 

fishnet material is more resistant to 

metal loss when subjected to electromagnetic radiation than gold used 

in earlier materials, metal loss is a 

major limiting factor. The difficulties 

in manufacturing materials at such a 

small scale also limit the attempts to 

harness light at ever smaller wavelengths.

“Right now, the materials we can 

build operate in only one direction,” 

Soukoulis says, “but we’ve still come 

a long ways in the six years since 

negative-index materials were first 

demonstrated.

“However, for applications to come 

within reach, several goals need to 

be achieved,” he adds. “We need 

to reduce losses by using crystalline 

metals and/or by introducing optically amplifying materials; develop 

three-dimensional rather than planar 

structures; create isotropic designs; 

and find ways of mass producing 

large-area structures.”

Q
LTHOUGH ANCIENT ALCHEMISTS FAILED

to turn base metals like lead into precious 

ones like gold and silver, one aspect of their 

misguided efforts survived ... the zest these 

“sorcerer scientists” exhibited to dramatically 

alter the properties of a material. However, present-day 

chemists and solid-state physicists pursue this passion 

according to scientific protocol, carefully making small 

changes in the composition of various compounds, especially ones that can be fine-tuned to extremes in behavior. 

Such is the challenge that entices Ames Laboratory’s 

novel materials group.

Ames Laboratory physicists Paul Canfield and Sergey 

Bud’ko along with Shuang Jia, a graduate student in Iowa 

State University’s department of physics and astronomy, 

have discovered a fantastic range of properties in a new 

family of zinc compounds. Even at over 85 percent zinc, 

the compounds can be tuned to take on some of the 

physical properties and behavior of other materials, ranging from copper to more exotic and complex compounds 

that are on, as Canfield says, “the hairy edge” of becoming magnetic (or even superconducting). Their versatility 

makes the new zinc compounds ideal for basic research 

efforts to observe and study the origins of phenomena 

such as magnetism. 

 The extraordinary tunability of the RT2

Zn20 (R=rare 

earth, T=transition metal, Zn=zinc) compounds has allowed the Ames researchers to make scores of different 

compounds with this “one rare earth-two transition metals-twenty zincs” formula. “We can make compounds for 

up to 10 transition metals, and for each of those we can 

include between seven and 14 rare earths,” says Canfield. 

“So that’s 70 to 140 compounds.”

One compound, YFe2

Zn20 (Y=yttrium, Fe=iron, 

Zn=zinc), is even closer to being ferromagnetic than 

palladium, a nearly ferromagnetic material traditionally 

studied to better understand magnetism. Canfield says 

palladium is a “runner-up” in terms of band magnetism 

– the magnetism of the common metals like iron, cobalt 

or nickel. These metals become ferromagnetic at such 

high temperatures that it’s difficult to study them in detail, 

so palladium is the next-best option

“But palladium is a little hard to tune,” says Canfield. 

“For basic research and possible applied materials, you 

want compounds that allow for the manipulation of their 

Physicists tweak zinc to get 

model compounds

BY SAREN JOHNSTON

Q

A single crystal of YFe2Zn20 is shown next to a mm scale. 

 It grows in this shape naturally and has mirrored facets.

A properties. We can tune the rare earth-iron(2)-zinc(20), 

so we can push these compounds even closer to ferromagnetism and try to understand the consequences.” 

Canfield, Bud’ko and Jia have tuned the zinc(20) compounds by substituting on the rare earth site, for example, 

by exchanging yttrium for gadolinium. “Gadolinium 

makes the compound suddenly go ferromagnetic at an 

unexpectedly high temperature,” says Canfield. 

The researchers can also tune the zinc(20) compounds by “playing” with the transition metal site. “By 

substituting cobalt for iron, we can back this material off,” 

says Canfield, “so we can calm things down a little and 

see what happens.”

The unique tunability of the new zinc(20) compounds 

is allowing Canfield, Bud’ko and Jia to approach the ferromagnetic transition point from where they hope to push 

the material to become ferromagnetic at very low temperatures. “If we could do that,” says Canfield, “we could 

actually witness the birth of this type of small-moment 

ferromagnetism. Instead of just before-and-after pictures, 

we could watch the whole film.”

Working toward that goal, Canfield and Bud’ko stress 

the importance of being able to draw on the resources 

available at a U.S. DOE laboratory. “It’s important to have 

design, synthesis and characterization tightly linked,” says 

Canfield. “You need your intrepid band of explorers able 

to investigate and contribute. Ames Lab has the world’s 

highest purity rare-earth elements, which we need to 

explore the effects of substitution on the rare-earth site. 

Also, band structure calculations have been very important in these nearly ferromagnetic materials, so the band 

structure expertise of our Ames Lab colleague German 

Samolyuk has been incredibly useful in helping us figure 

out the next moves.” 

INQUIRY SPRING 2007 5

For more information:

Paul Canfield, (515) 294-6270

canfield@ameslab.gov 

Research funded by:

DOE Basic Energy Sciences, 

 Materials Science and 

 Engineering Division

Canfield Bud’ko Jia
6 INQUIRY SPRING 2007 

W ith roots in the Manhattan Project and the development of a new process for refining 

uranium, Ames Laboratory has been a leader in the development, synthesis and characterization 

of new materials throughout its 60-year history. The accomplishments shown here represent 

just a few of the many scientific contributions that have come from the researchers at Ames 

Laboratory since its inception on May 17, 1947.

Frank Spedding and 

Harley Wilhelm led the 

uranium purification efforts during the Manhattan Project. Spedding 

later became the Lab’s 

first director. 

Art D’Silva, assistant 

chemist, shows the 

phosphor image intensifer screen that he and 

Velmer Fassel, deputy 

director, developed.

Ames Lab operated a research reactor from the early 1960s to 1978.

Inductively coupled plasma-atomic 

emission spectroscopy.





Ames Laboratory Shaping Science for 60 Years

A uranium biscuit 

produced using a 

bomb-reduction 

process discovered 

by Spedding and 

Wilhelm.



Harley Wilhelm

Frank 

Spedding


INQUIRY SPRING 2007 7

Ed Yeung is a multiple R&D 100 awardwinner for separation technologies.

Iver Anderson holds a 

nozzle used in high-pressure gas atomization to 

produce ultrafine metallic 

powders.

Sam Houk adjusts inductively coupled 

plasma-mass spectrometry equipment 

used to provide ultratrace analysis for 

elements and isotopes.





Costas Soukoulis holds a 

photonic crystal that can 

negatively refract light.



Magnetic refrigeration was 

proven possible using a gadolinium-silicon-germanium alloy 

developed by Karl Gschneidner 

and Vitalij Pecharsky. 

Lead-free solder developed at Ames Lab is 

licensed worldwide and 

has generated more than 

$10 million in royalties.





Magnesium-diboride was 

shown to superconduct at 

temperatures higher than 

previously seen.

Ames Lab is a recognized 

leader in quasicrystal research as well as the growth 

of single cyrstals.





Photonic band-gap crystals 

offer the ability to control light 

the way semiconductors 

control electricity.



1947 - 2007

John McClelland developed an 

R&D 100 award-winning technology for a photoacoustic cell.




8 INQUIRY SPRING 2007

since 1963, he became the first director of Ames Lab’s 

Rare-Earth Information Center when it was established in 

1966. He has published over 500 papers in the field, and 

his research in magnetic refrigeration is widely recognized 

throughout the world.

Gschneidner is also a Fellow of the American Society for 

Materials International, The Minerals, Metals and Materials 

Society and the American Physical Society. He is an honorary member of the Materials Research Society of India and 

The Japan Institute of Metals.

He is the fourth Ames Laboratory researcher named to 

the National Academy of Engineering and only the sixth 

overall with ISU ties. He joins Ames Lab’s Nondestructive Evaluation Program Director and fellow Iowa State 

University Anson Marston Distinguished Professor Bruce 

Thompson, associate researcher Dan Schectman (Materials Chemistry and Biomolecular Materials), and retired 

researcher Donald Thompson (Nondestructive Evaluation). 

Senior chemist John Corbett is a member of the National 

Academy of Sciences.

While he was aware he’d been nominated for the Academy, Gschneidner says his actual election was a surprise. 

However, he doesn’t expect the “fame” to necessarily be 

followed by fortune.

“People have asked me if this means I’ll be getting the 

big bucks,” he says. “Actually, it’s going to end up costing 

me $200 a year for the membership,” though he adds with 

a chuckle that he’ll get a discount because of his age. (He 

turns 77 in November.)

And don’t expect him to rest on his laurels. He still 

maintains a full schedule, splitting his time between the 

research lab, the library and the lecture circuit.

“I plan to keep doing the same things — looking for new 

things and trying to figure out what makes them work,” he 

says. “It’s what keeps me young.”

He also credits those working with him, particularly 

senior scientists Vitalij Pecharsky and Alan Russell in recent 

years, for much of his success.

“It’s like an orchestra conductor or the manager of a ball 

team,” he explains. “They often get the credit, but without all those talented people around them, they wouldn’t 

get far. I’ve been fortunate throughout my career to be 

surrounded by top-notch people and to have a wonderful, 

supportive and understanding wife.”

Karl Gschneidner named to the 

National Academy of Engineering

“Quite an Honor”

BY KERRY GIBSON

NE WALL OF KARL GSCHNEIDNER’S SPEDDING

Hall office is chock-full of honors and awards 

the Ames Laboratory senior metallurgist has received throughout his distinguished career. But 

he’ll soon have to make room for the biggest 

honor of them all — the one that names him as a member 

of the National Academy of Engineering. Gschneidner was 

one of 64 American researchers and nine foreign associates inducted into the prestigious 

Academy earlier this year.

“It’s quite an honor, considering all the competition,” he 

says. “There are a lot of good 

people out there, so I’m glad 

we made it!”

The National Academy of 

Engineering is one branch of 

the National Academies organization that also includes the 

National Academy of Sciences, 

the Institute of Medicine and the 

National Research Council. Established in 1964, the NAE has a 

fairly exclusive membership with 

only 1,945 Americans and 184 

foreign associates inducted in its 

43-year history.

Academy membership 

honors those who have made 

outstanding contributions to 

“engineering research, practice 

or education, including, where 

appropriate, significant contributions to the engineering 

literature,” and to the “pioneering of new and developing fields of technology, making major advancements in 

traditional fields of engineering or developing/implementing 

innovative approaches to engineering education.” 

Gschneidner was specifically cited for “contributions 

to the science and technology of rare-earth materials,” a 

further acknowledgment of his role as one of the world’s 

foremost authorities in the physical metallurgy and thermal 

and electrical behaviors of rare-earth materials. An Ames 

Lab researcher and Iowa State University faculty member 

O

Q

Karl Gschneidner
INQUIRY SPRING 2007 9

MES LAB RESEARCHERS ALAN RUSSELL AND

Larry Jones are employing some modern-day 

alchemy in an effort to find a material with 

properties of rare and high-priced palladium. If they’re successful, it could remove 

a major roadblock from the path of hydrogen fuel-cell 

powered vehicles.

Hydrogen fuel-cell technology sounds almost too good 

to be true. You combine cheap and plentiful hydrogen and 

oxygen gas, the fuel cell generates electricity and the byproduct is simply water. But if the hydrogen gas contains 

impurities, such as water vapor or carbon monoxide, it can 

“gum up” the fuel cell’s separation membrane, dropping 

efficiency or halting the process altogether. Pure hydrogen, 

however, is hard to come by, and that’s where palladium 

enters the picture.

“Palladium acts like an atomic filter – the hydrogen 

atoms readily diffuse right through the metal,” Russell 

says. “But palladium is $11,000 a kilogram, and even if 

you didn’t choke at the price, there isn’t enough palladium 

in the entire world to convert the world’s automobiles to 

hydrogen power,” Russell says. “So the trick is to find a material with the same properties as palladium that is cheaper 

and much more readily available.”

His use of the word trick isn’t a stretch. Not only does 

the material have to be less expensive and readily available, 

it has to allow hydrogen to pass through it and be ductile 

enough to be drawn into long, thin tubes. It also has to 

resist oxidation, because oxygen and water vapor are commonly present in impure hydrogen. And finally, hydrogen 

has a nasty habit of making metals brittle, so the metal 

also has to handle repeated heating and cooling cycles, 

while loaded with hydrogen, without 

becoming brittle.

“With so many variables, we don’t 

really have any analytical tools that 

would let us mathematically predict 

the ideal composition,” Russell says, 

“so we have to use a Thomas Edison 

approach – relying on intuition and a 

fair amount of luck to come up with a 

combination that works.”

The three-year project is being 

spearheaded by Robert Buxbaum, 

president of REB Research, a Michigan firm involved in hydrogen filtration and fuel-cell technology. Buxbaum proposed developing 100 different 

alloys, relying on the expertise of Russell and Jones 

in the field of metals development to pick the 

mixtures. 

Roughly halfway through the project, about 60 

binary alloys have been developed with additional 

ones in the planning stages. The results have 

been mixed, but Russell indicated one sample is 

quite promising, and several others show promise.

“There have been surprises. Some alloys that you 

would expect to be ductile turn out to be hopelessly brittle, 

like glass,” Russell says. “We also tried a material with 25 

percent ruthenium, an element which is notorious for making alloys brittle, but that material turned out to be quite 

ductile.” 

Samples produced in Ames are first cold rolled to see 

if they are ductile. Those showing promise are further 

tested and shipped to REB Research where they’re tested 

to determine how easily hydrogen will diffuse through the 

metal. Those showing promise get further testing to see 

if they can be formed into tubes and how they respond to 

heating and cooling cycles. But even those materials that 

are rejected as a palladium substitute may ultimately wind 

up as useful for other purposes.

A

BY KERRY GIBSON

For more information:

Alan Russell, (515) 294-8137

russell@ameslab.gov

Larry Jones, (515) 294-5236

jonesll@ameslab.gov

Research funded by:

REB Research, from a DOE 

grant supporting the Hydrogen 

Fuel Initiative

Q

 Alan Russell Larry Jones

Palladium substitute could make 

hydrogen fuel-cell technology effective

(above) Buttons of alloy samples are initially tested 

for ductility. (below right) Some fail the ductility 

test, but those showing promise are rolled and cut 

for further testing for hydrogen permeability.

Removing a Hydrogen Roadblock
For more information:

Kenneth “Mark” Bryden, 

(515) 294-3891

kmbryden@ameslab.gov 

Research funded by:

DOE Office of Fossil Energy 

10 INQUIRY SPRING 2007

NGINEERS CAN LOOK INSIDE A POWER PLANT, 

adjust a row of processors and quickly see the 

results all with a few mouse clicks using virtual 

engineering tools developed by researchers at 

Ames Laboratory. Such tools are among software 

programs developed by the new Ames Lab Simulation, 

Modeling and Decision Science program designed to help 

engineers make faster and better design decisions.

Simulation, modeling and decision science researchers 

create computer applications that convert large 3-D data 

sets into virtual models that perform just like real-world 

versions. Engineers view and interact with the models on 

their computer screens or in a virtual-reality room.

“Simulation, modeling and decision science brings 

together all the pieces of engineering data, and engineers 

can actually see what they are doing,” says Mark Bryden, 

Ames Laboratory scientist and Iowa State University associate professor of mechanical engineering, who directs the 

new program. “They can take a close look at a fan in a 

virtual engine, make a change to the fan, and then immediately see what happens to the engine’s heat-removal 

capability in the virtual environment.” 

Trying out engineering plans in the virtual realm leads to 

sound problem-solving and design in reality. 

“We are interested in how engineers can deal with uncertainty in design, and how we can help engineers make 

good decisions,” Bryden says.

Bryden and his team have been studying simulation, 

modeling and decision science at Ames Lab for several 

New research program 

studies simulation, modeling 

and decision science

years, and the virtual engineering tools are already in use 

in DOE projects. Researchers are developing software to 

model FutureGen, an experimental power plant planned 

to be the first coal-fueled, near-zero-emissions plant in the 

world. They also are using the software for turbine- and 

sensor-modeling research.

Virtual engineering research did not fit into any existing 

Ames Lab scientific program, so Lab management created the new Simulation, Modeling and Decision Science 

program. Bryden’s work on TBET, a texture-based virtual 

engineering tool, won an R&D 100 Award in 2006, and 

the simulation, modeling and decision science field is 

growing rapidly.

“We have the only virtual engineering software available right now. We want to continue to be leaders in 

the field and leaders in enabling change in engineering,” 

Bryden says.

Sim

Q

E

Software developed by researchers in the new Simulation, Modeling and Decision Science program allows users to enter a virtual environment that displays velocity information from a data set about the birth of a star.

City

BY BREEHAN GERLEMAN
INQUIRY SPRING 2007 11

Iowa City Regina Education Center 

finished third in the Hydrogen Fuelcell Model Car challenge at the U.S. 

Department of Energy’s National High 

School Science Bowl®, April 26-30, 

and collected a check for $1,250 for 

their efforts. The money won by the 

Regina team will be used by their 

school to promote science in the 

classroom. 

“The fuel-cell competition was 

great,” said Josh Modrick, a senior who 

competed on the Regina team. “It 

provided a great opportunity to actually ‘do’ science.” 

The Regina team finished 18th 

overall in the 64-team academic 

competition portion of the National 

Science Bowl. The team joined more 

than 300 students from across the 

United States who competed in the 

national event in Washington, D.C. 

Teams made it to the finals by winning 

Regional Science Bowl competitions 

held in their home states. Regina won 

the 17th annual regional competition 

sponsored by Ames Laboratory and 

Iowa State University on January 27 at 

Iowa State. 

Middle school students got their 

own crack at Science Bowl fame by 

competing in the 4th annual Ames 

Lab/ISU Middle School Regional Science Bowl competition held at ISU 

EDUCATION

on April 13-14. The two-day event 

consisted of a hydrogen fuel-cell car 

challenge the first day, followed by 

the academic competition on the 

second day. Evans Middle School of 

Ottumwa fought off many challengers 

to win the car race. In the academic 

portion of the event, Central Academy 

of Des Moines re-established itself as 

the team to beat, defeating Eleanor 

Roosevelt Middle School of Dubuque 

in a highly competitive championship 

match. This is the third year in the 

four-year history of the Ames Lab/ISU 

Middle School Science Bowl that 

Central Academy has been the victor. 

Central Academy’s Iowa win qualified 

the team to compete in the National 

Middle School Science Bowl in Denver, Colo., June 21-24.

(From upper left) Members of the Regina team included Phil Ward, Wes 

Hottel, Vanessa Shiu, Peter Montag and Josh Modrick.

2007 Middle School Science Bowl champions from Central Academy are (seated, 

left to right) Luchang Wang, Younan Zhu, 

Alick Feng; and (standing, left to right) 

Alan Goldman, Ames Lab interim director; Ian Pierson; Kenny Suh and Joyce 

Johnson (coach).

Competitors make some last-minute 

adjustments to their hydrogen fuel-cell 

car at the start line.
Ames Laboratory

111 Technical and Administrative Services Facility

Ames, Iowa 50011-3020

515-294-9557

www.ameslab.gov

A U.S. Department of Energy laboratory operated by Iowa State University