"Visualizing the Hidden Half: Plant-Microbe Interactions in the Rhizosphere" Plant roots and the associated rhizosphere constitute a dynamic environment that fosters numerous intra- and interkingdom interactions, including metabolite exchange between plants and soil mediated by root exudates and the...

In highly alkaline solution, aluminum speciates as the tetrahedrally coordinated aluminate monomer, Al(OH)4− and/or dimer Al2O(OH)62−, yet precipitates as octahedrally coordinated gibbsite (Al(OH)3). This tetrahedral to octahedral transformation governs Al precipitation, which is crucial to...

Amongst the challenges for a variety of research fields are the visualization of solid-liquid interfaces and understanding how they are affected by the solution conditions such as ion concentrations, pH, ligands, and trace additives, as well as the underlying crystallography and chemistry. In this...

Particle-based crystallization is an important pathway to synthesize advanced materials with complex structures. Unlike monomer-by-monomer addition or Ostwald ripening, particle-based crystallization occurs via particle-by-particle addition to form larger crystals. This chapter reviews the...

Gibbsite [α-Al(OH)3] is the solubility limiting phase for aluminum across a wide pH range, and it is a common mineral phase with many industrial applications. The growth mechanism of this layered-structure material, however, remains incompletely understood. Synthesis of gibbsite at low to...

Pending Review Microbiomes contribute to multiple ecosystem services by transforming organic matter in soil. Extreme shifts in the environment, such as drying-rewetting cycles during drought, can impact microbial metabolism of organic matter by altering their physiology and function. These...

Aluminate salts precipitated from caustic alkaline solutions exhibit a correlation between the anionic speciation and the identity of the alkali cation in the precipitate, with the aluminate ions occurring either in monomeric (Al(OH)4–) or dimeric (Al2O(OH)62–) forms. The origin of this correlation...

Although nanometer-sized aluminum hydroxide clusters (i.e., ϵ-Al13, [Al13O4(OH)24(H2O)12]7+) command a central role in aluminum ion speciation and transformations between minerals, measurement of their translational diffusion is often limited to indirect methods. Here, 27Al pulsed field gradient...

Our understanding of the process of mineral nucleation is starting to evolve from the solely thermodynamical aspects in classical nucleation theory toward a mechanistic study of reactions influenced by solvation structures of ions and their dynamics. A knowledge of how these atomic and molecular...

ABSTRACT Tissue- and cell-specific expression patterns are highly variable within and across individuals, leading to altered host responses after acute virus infection. Unraveling key tissue-specific response patterns provides novel opportunities for defining fundamental mechanisms of virus-host...

Over the last several decades, there have been several studies examining the radiation stability of boehmite and other aluminum oxyhydroxides, yet less is known about the impact of radiation on boehmite dissolution. Here, we investigate radiation effects on the dissolution behavior of boehmite by...

Representing biological networks as graphs is a powerful approach to reveal underlying patterns, signatures, and critical components from high-throughput biomolecular data. However, graphs do not natively capture the multi-way relationships present among genes and proteins in biological systems...

Nonadiabatic dynamical processes such as proton-coupled electron transfer and excited state intramolecular proton transfer have been the subject of much research. One of the promising theoretical methods to describe these processes is the nuclear–electronic orbital (NEO) approach. This approach...

Understanding molecular-scale factors governing the precipitation of aluminum hydroxides, such as gibbsite, under alkaline conditions is important for the formation of laterite deposits, as well as aluminum processing. However, mechanisms enabling tetrahedral aluminate ions to assemble into...

To better understand the effects of solution chemistry on particle aggregation in the complex legacy tank wastes at the Hanford (WA) and Savannah River (SC) sites, we have performed a series of tumbler small- and ultra-small-angle neutron scattering experiments on 20 wt % solid slurries of...