Professor Ting Guo's research group at UC Davis focuses on studying mechanisms of and the control of the energy flow between nanomaterials and between nanomaterials and their environment. The form of energy may vary from chemical energy to visible photon energy to x-ray photon energy. Nanomaterials can be uniquely used to harvest these forms of energy and direct them to facilitate chemical reactions including catalytic reactions, to create radicals in aqueous solution, and to produce local temperature rise. Most of these energy redirection and control processes can be made to occur to sub-ten nanometer nanomaterials. We therefore call these processes Redirecting Energy Flow using Nanomaterial Devices (REFUND) or Phenomena in Sub-Ten Nanometer Materials (PISTNM). Currently we are investigating high temperature catalysis using 1-nm nickel nanoparticles immobilized at the tips of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs), as well as enhanced x-ray radiation absorption and energy deposition using sub-ten nanometer gold nanoparticles.