The laboratory conducts research into areas of national concern, including the synthesis and study of new materials, energy resources, high-speed computer design, and environmental cleanup and restoration.

Processes developed at Ames Laboratory resulted in the production of the purest rare-earth metals in the world while at the same time greatly reducing their price.

As part of that effort, the Lab built a 5-megawatt heavy water reactor for neutron diffraction studies and additional isotope separation research.

Ames Laboratory responded by putting new emphasis on applied mathematics, solar power, fossil fuels and pollution control.

Foremost among them was inductively coupled plasma-atomic emission spectroscopy, which could rapidly and simultaneously detect up to 40 different trace metals from a small sample.

Other key accomplishments from the 1980s included: Encouraged by the United States Department of Energy, in the 1990s Ames Laboratory continued its efforts to transfer basic research findings to industry for the development of new materials, products, and processes.

Velmer A. Fassel (Ph.D. 1947)(deceased 1998), developed the inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP-AES) analytical process, used for chemical analysis worldwide; former deputy director of the Ames Laboratory.

1952, Ph.D 1957) (deceased) elected Fellow of the National Academy of Engineering in 2007, Gschneidner was a world authority in the physical metallurgy, and thermal and electrical behavior of rare-earth materials.

John Corbett (deceased 2013), chemistry and Ames Laboratory, member of the National Academy of Sciences, created the first non-carbon example of buckyballs; discovered more than 1,000 new materials.

Soukoulis is a recipient of the Descartes Prize for Excellence in Scientific Collaborative Research, the European Union’s highest honor in the field of science.

Dan Shechtman, materials science and engineering and Associate of Ames National Laboratory, awarded the 2011 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery of quasicrystals at Johns Hopkins University.

Also received the AVS Medard W. Welch Award, which recognizes outstanding research in the fields of materials, interfaces, and processing (presented in 2014).

Edward Yeung, chemistry and Ames Lab, first person to quantitatively analyze the chemical contents of a single human red blood cell, using a device that he designed and built; the development could lead to improved detection of AIDS, cancer and genetic diseases such as Alzheimer's, muscular dystrophy and Down's syndrome.

Paul Canfield, Sergey Bud'ko, Costas Soukoulis, physics and Ames Laboratory, named to Thomas Reuters' World's Most Influential Scientific Minds 2014.

The award recognizes the greatest number of highly cited papers (among the top 1 percent for their subject field and year of publication between 2002 and 2012).