Close-up of green rod-shaped bacteria or microorganisms floating against a blurry background.

Enabled by Berkeley Lab’s world-class user facilities and complementary research programs, our scientists and engineers contribute groundbreaking discoveries and innovative solutions to complex scientific and societal challenges. We advance biological science relevant to national-scale challenges in energy, environment, health, biomanufacturing, and technology development.

Illustration of a flexible energy storage device with molecular structures on the surface, accompanied by lightning bolts symbolizing electricity and power.

The Energy Sciences Area (ESA) is Berkeley Lab’s home for fundamental research in materials and chemical sciences. Comprising four scientific divisions — including two Office of Science-funded national user facilities — and major collaborative interdisciplinary research programs, centers, and capabilities. ESA fosters scientific excellence, external partnerships, and diverse teams to achieve transformational breakthroughs in materials and chemistry that provide the foundations for new energy, information, and quantum technologies.

Gloved hand holds a small yellow and white solar cell with tweezers above stacked plastic containers holding other multicolored cells.

The Energy Technologies Area (ETA) is unique in translating fundamental scientific discoveries into scalable technology adoption. Our approach combines an understanding of the marketplace and the role of state and federal regulation and policies. ETA’s research drives real-world, practical results that affect and improve the everyday lives of Americans and those across the globe. Saving energy and battling the Climate Crisis are key to the foundation of our research, which is driven by techno-economic analysis and in-lab experimentation and discovery.

Scientist in a field uses a soil corer to collect samples, with a white bucket nearby and rolling hills in the background.

The water, food, and energy we depend on all come from the natural world, yet the natural cycles that sustain them are under threat, and basic aspects of Earth sciences governing our ability to safeguard and access these resources are not yet fully understood. EESA scientists conduct research in fields such as climate science, water resources, and Earth’s energy systems that underpin sustainable solutions to the growing need for water and energy resources.