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Physical and Life Sciences
Four Lawrence Livermore scientists named Distinguished Members of Technical Staff
Four Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) researchers have been named Distinguished Members of Technical Staff (DMTS) for their extraordinary scientific and technical contributions to the Laboratory and its missions, as acknowledged by their professional peers and the larger community. Peter Beiersdorfer and Paul Springer of the Physical and Life Sciences…
Theory aids analysis of nuclear materials
Nuclear emergency teams, safeguards specialists and others may one day benefit from an expanded nuclear fission chain theory and detectors developed by a team of Lawrence Livermore Nationla Laboratory (LLNL) physicists. The Livermore scientists have bolstered their theory for understanding nuclear fission chains -- a cascade of atomic nuclei splitting, each initiated by a…
LLNL and Virginia Tech researchers achieve more complex 3D-printed graphene aerogel
Graphene aerogel is lighter than air but as strong as steel, and it’s already proven useful in aerospace, energy storage and insulation. While there have been recent advances in 3D printing of the novel material, achieving complex structures has been elusive, hampering the unique material’s full potential. To date, 3D printing of graphene aerogel has been done using direct…
Summer scholars learn value of team science
A group of NIF & Photon Science summer scholars and visiting graduate students are experiencing the value of teamwork as they conduct experiments at LLNL’s Jupiter Laser Facility (JLF). Jesus Hinojosa, 26, a University of Michigan graduate student, and Matthew Thibodeau, 21, a Rice University undergraduate, joined a team of veteran scientists and researchers to explore…
National Ignition Facility reveals how hydrogen becomes metallic inside gas giant planets
Swirling dense metallic hydrogen dominates the interiors of Jupiter, Saturn and many extra-solar planets. Building precise models of these giant planets requires an accurate description of the transition of pressurized hydrogen into this metallic substance — a long-standing scientific challenge. In a paper published today by Science, a research team led by scientists at…
Quest for source of black hole dark matter
Like a game of "hide and seek," Lawrence Livermore astrophysicists know that there are black holes hiding in the Milky Way, just not where. If they find them toward the galactic bulge (a tightly packed group of stars) and the Magellanic Clouds, then black holes as massive as 10,000 times the mass of the sun might make up dark matter. If they are only toward the galactic…
Lab researchers find magnetic fields impact atmospheric circulation of gas giant planets
Magnetic fields around a planet or a star can overpower the zonal jets that affect atmospheric circulation. New research by a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientist and a collaborator from the Australian National University (ANU) provides a theoretical explanation for why self-organized fluid flows called zonal jets or "zonal flows" can be suppressed by…
Using microbes to convert CO2 to natural gas
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), in collaboration with Southern California Gas Co. and Stanford University, are using microbes to convert carbon dioxide directly to renewable natural gas. The U.S. Department of Energy recently awarded the power-to-gas project $800,000. SoCalGas will provide co-funding of $400,000 in addition to $125,000 of seed funding it…
New data sets enhance global climate models
A new initiative by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists collects, archives and documents climate data sets to support the coordinated modeling activities that study past, present and future climates. The initiative, known as input data sets for Model Intercomparison Projects (input4MIPs), is featured in a recent edition of the American Geophysical…
FDA approves medical device utilizing LLNL-developed shape memory technology
The Food and Drug Administration has approved the use of a medical device in humans for deliberately blocking blood flow to treat bleeding abnormalities or other conditions, a procedure known as embolization. The device integrates expanding shape memory polymer technology that was partly developed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). The FDA recently granted…
HED Science Center Hosts Workshop on Nuclear Processes in Dense Plasmas
The Laboratory’s High Energy Density (HED) Science Center hosted a workshop regarding nuclear processes in dense plasmas, providing a forum where members of the HED science and nuclear physics communities could share ideas. The workshop took place on July 30 and August 1, 2018, at LLNL. According to Frank Graziani, director of the HED Science Center, the workshop offered…
Lawrence Livermore chemist elected ACS fellow
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) chemist Dawn Shaughnessy, whose team helped discover six new elements on the periodic table, has been elected a fellow of the American Chemical Society (ACS). The fellows program began in 2009 to recognize and honor ACS members for outstanding achievements in and contributions to science, the profession and ACS. Shaughnessy is…
Exploring the chemistry of nuclear explosions
To understand fallout formation from a nuclear explosion, it’s important to look at the gas phase of metal oxides within the device. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists have developed a plasma-flow reactor to experimentally simulate the late cooling of post-detonation fireballs where temperature drops below 10,000 K. They investigate the formation of…
Human influence detected in changing seasons
For the first time, scientists from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and five other organizations have shown that human influences significantly impact the size of the seasonal cycle of temperature in the lowest layer of the atmosphere. To demonstrate this, they applied a so-called "fingerprint" technique. Fingerprinting seeks to separate human and natural…
Cohen honored with plasma physics award
Lawrence Livermore retiree Bruce Cohen has been selected as the recipient of the 2018 IEEE Nuclear and Plasma Sciences Society’s Charles K. Birdsall Award for "contributions to the numerical simulation of plasmas, particularly multiple time-scale methods and to their application to diverse plasma physics problems, from laser-plasma interactions to tokamaks." The Birdsall…
Research by Lawerence Livermore scientists may help validate organ-on-a-chip devices
A new study in which Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists compared drug responses in the brains of rodents to drug responses of brain cells cultured in Lab-developed "brain-on-a-chip" devices may be a critical first step to validating chip-based brain platforms, LLNL researchers said. In the study, published online today in the journal Scientific…
Researchers work to advance understanding of hydrodynamic instabilities in NIF, astrophysics
In a Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) "Special Feature" paper published online June 26, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and University of Michigan researchers reported on recent experiments and techniques designed to improve understanding and control of hydrodynamic (fluid) instabilities in high energy density (HED) settings such as…
Understanding the universe through neutrinos
Determining features of the elusive particle known as a neutrino – through the observation of an extremely rare nuclear process called neutrinoless double-beta decay (NDBD) -- could provide a glimpse into the nature of the universe during the earliest moments of the Big Bang. As part of an international collaboration, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL)…
LLNL physicist wins APS excellence award
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) magnetic fusion physicist Max Fenstermacher has been awarded the 2018 John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research from the American Physical Society. He is cited jointly with Todd Evans of General Atomics and Richard Moyer of the University of California, San Diego. Fenstermacher’s team was cited "for the first…
LLNL applies high-performance computing to improve understanding of traumatic brain injury
Since the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq began in 2001, more than 350,000 cases of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in servicemen and women have been reported to the Department of Defense (DOD). Despite several decades of failed clinical trials, there remains no acute treatment for TBI and few tools to aid clinicians in providing a prognosis for TBI patients, military or…
