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Early access systems at LLNL mark progress toward El Capitan

Though the arrival of the exascale supercomputer El Capitan at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is still almost two years away, teams of code developers are busy working on predecessor systems to ensure critical applications are ready for Day One. Delivered in February, the “RZNevada” early-access system is providing experts at the National Nuclear Security…

Powering up: LLNL prepares for exascale with massive energy and water upgrade

A supercomputer doesn’t just magically appear, especially one as large and as fast as Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s upcoming exascale-class behemoth El Capitan. At peak usage, El Capitan — projected to be the world’s most powerful computer by 2023 — will require about as much energy as a small city, so it takes years of planning, infrastructure upgrades and an…

Lab garners five technology commercialization grants

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and engineers have posted another banner year securing major grants through the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Technology Commercialization Fund (TCF). “I think the Laboratory did very well again, reflecting a variety of types and approaches to our research and development projects,” said Rich Rankin, the director of…

LLNL explores laser beam shaping to improve metal 3D printing

While laser-based 3D printing techniques have revolutionized the production of metal parts by greatly expanding design complexity, the laser beams traditionally used in metal printing have drawbacks that can lead to defects and poor mechanical performance. Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) are addressing the issue by exploring alternative shapes…

NNSA taps Dell Technologies to provide expanded computing resources for stockpile stewardship

The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration’s (DOE/NNSA’s) Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) announced the awarding of a subcontract to Dell Technologies for additional supercomputing systems to support NNSA’s nuclear deterrent mission. In partnership with Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL), the…

Inaugural industry forum inspires ML community

LLNL held its first-ever Machine Learning for Industry Forum (ML4I) on Aug. 10-12. Co-hosted by the Lab’s High Performance Computing Innovation Center (HPCIC) and Data Science Institute (DSI), the virtual event brought together more than 500 participants from the Department of Energy (DOE) complex, commercial companies, professional societies and academia. Industry…

Manufacturing Day webinar highlights industry collaboration, emerging technologies

To celebrate Manufacturing Day 2021, the High Performance Computing for Energy Innovation (HPC4EI) initiative will hold a special webinar on Oct. 1 featuring speakers from the Department of Energy (DOE), presentations by DOE scientists and students and virtual tours. The free event runs from 7:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. PDT and is open to all. The webinar’s plenary session…

Lawrence Livermore-led effort one of nine DOE-funded data reduction projects

A Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory-led effort in data compression was one of nine projects recently funded by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for research aimed at shrinking the amount of data needed to advance scientific discovery. LLNL was among five DOE national laboratories to receive awards totaling $13.7 million for data reduction in scientific applications…

DOE-funded project to advance portability of heterogenous HPC applications

A project involving researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and national lab and academic collaborators has received U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) funding as part of an effort to adapt scientific software for next-generation high-performance computing (HPC) systems. The project, “ComPort: Rigorous Testing Methods to Safeguard Software Porting,” will…

LLNL, other Bay Area labs to host webinar about business partnerships, the future of semiconductors

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and its three partner national labs in the Bay Area Lab Innovation Networking Center (LINC) will offer a webinar about the future of semiconductors and advanced materials on Wednesday, Aug. 25. The two-hour virtual Zoom webinar, called “Over the Horizon” and set to start at noon Pacific time, is primarily targeted at Bay Area…

LLNL/ATOM engagement with Purdue introduces students to drug design modeling

Through an engagement with Purdue University’s The Data Mine learning community, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Purdue are partnering to speed up drug design using computational tools under the Accelerating Therapeutic Opportunities in Medicine (ATOM) project. Over two recent semesters (fall 2020 and spring 2021), LLNL bioinformatics scientist and ATOM…

LLNL optimizes flow-through electrodes for electrochemical reactors with 3D printing

To take advantage of the growing abundance and cheaper costs of renewable energy, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and engineers are 3D printing flow-through electrodes (FTEs), core components of electrochemical reactors used for converting CO2 and other molecules to useful products. As described in a paper published by the Proceedings of the…

Scientists use radiography to understand the evolution of liquid and solid microjets

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists have experimentally tested the predictions of a 2020 study that computationally investigated the effect of melting on shock driven metal microjets. That earlier work predicted that melting the base material does not necessarily lead to a substantial increase in jet mass. The LLNL team confirmed the predictions of…

Registrations ongoing for virtual forum on industrial machine learning applications

Registration is open through July 29 for the first-ever Machine Learning for Industry Forum (ML4I), a three-day virtual event starting Aug. 10. The forum aims to foster and illustrate the adoption of machine learning methods for practical industrial outcomes, with a strong emphasis on manufacturing. Over the course of the event, attendees will engage in dialog about…

LLNL and collaborators improve electrochemical reactor performance through 3D printing

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and their collaborators are leveraging the power of 3D printing to improve the performance of electrochemical reactors used to convert carbon dioxide (CO2) to useful energy sources, chemicals and material feedstocks. Working under a cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) with Stanford University and…

New research proves quantum computing errors correlated, ties them to cosmic rays

Research by a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) physicist and a host of collaborators is shedding new light on one of the major challenges to realizing the promise and potential of quantum computing — error correction. In a new paper published in Nature and co-authored by LLNL physicist Jonathan DuBois, scientists examined quantum computing stability,…

Virtual LLNL-UC Merced Data Science Challenge tackles asteroid detection though machine learning

Over three weeks, students from the University of California, Merced collaborated online with mentors at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) to tackle a real-world challenge problem: using machine learning to identify potentially hazardous asteroids that could pose an existential threat to humanity. The Data Science Challenge was the third such annual event for…

Lawrence Livermore team looks at nuclear weapon effects for near-surface detonations

A Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) team has taken a closer look at how nuclear weapon blasts close to the Earth’s surface create complications in their effects and apparent yields. Attempts to correlate data from events with low heights of burst revealed a need to improve the theoretical treatment of strong blast waves rebounding from hard surfaces. This led…

Lawrence Livermore team looks at nuclear weapon effects for near-surface detonations

A Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) team has taken a closer look at how nuclear weapon blasts close to the Earth’s surface create complications in their effects and apparent yields. Attempts to correlate data from events with low heights of burst revealed a need to improve the theoretical treatment of strong blast waves rebounding from hard surfaces. This led…

Lab postdocs invited to prestigious Heidelberg Forum

Two Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) postdoctoral researchers are among a select group of 200 scientists invited to attend the 8thHeidelberg Laureate Forum, an international conference that connects young researchers with laureates of the major prizes in mathematics and computer science. For a week in September, LLNL computational engineering postdocs Ruben…