Girls Who Code ‘Altamont Connection’ brings students from Livermore and Tracy to the Lab

High school students from Livermore and Tracy visited Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) on May 5 for a first-of-its kind event bringing the two cities’ Girls Who Code (GWC) programs and others together on-site for group activities and tours under a new “Altamont Connection” moniker. The event, which included tours of the National Ignition Facility, Discovery Center and Advanced...

Lab engineer shares in DOE project award for work on the Vera C. Rubin Observatory

A Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) engineer and the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory are among those sharing a Department of Energy (DOE) award for their roles in building the world’s newest observatory. The DOE honor, the 2021 project management achievement award, was recently presented for work done on the Legacy Survey of Space and Time camera (LSSTCam), part of the...

LLNL’s Kamath honored as 2023 SIAM fellow

The Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), the world’s premier professional organization for applied mathematicians and computational scientists, has selected Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory research staff member Chandrika Kamath as a member of the SIAM fellows class of 2023.   The prestigious fellow designation is a lifetime honorific title and honors SIAM members...

Computational Engineering is key to ignition success

In a room illuminated by blinking lights and glowing monitors, more than 2,000 synchronized computers are triggered to run 5 million lines of code. The intricate code language is responsible for aligning and firing 192 laser beams — and carrying some 800 channels of target diagnostic data — efficiently and reliably several times a day. This isn’t a scene from a science fiction movie: it’s the...

All eyes on Lynda Tesillo

For Lynda Tesillo, Women’s History Month means more than reflecting on the past. Her path to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory started with studying engineering at a university — a decision which put her in a unique position within her family. “We had limited resources growing up, particularly when it came to affording an education,” Tesillo said. “At the time, my mother...

LLNL researchers develop method for real-time defect detection in metal 3D-printed parts

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) engineers and scientists have developed a method for detecting and predicting strut defects in 3D-printed metal lattice structures during a print through a combination of monitoring, imaging techniques and multi-physics simulations. The high-strength and low-density properties of metallic lattices have found applications in many fields. During...

‘Science on Saturday’ lecture to showcase 3D printing technologies and applications

Who: Stan Hitomi, retired educator and district administrator for the San Ramon Valley Unified School District, will present “3D Printing: From Imagination to Realization” joined by a host of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists, including: Eric Duoss, Julie Mancini, Monica Moya, Dominique Porcincula, William Smith, Chris Spadaccini and Becca Walton. The event is the final...

Collapsing bubbles show new ejecta production mechanism can occur under multiple-shock conditions

New research led by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) provides a better understanding of ejecta production, which has been the subject of broad interest for more than 60 years throughout the scientific community. Ejecta are particles of material forced out or ejected from an area. The phenomena are observed across many multi-disciplinary applications, including volcanic...

LLNL celebrates National Engineering Week/Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is celebrating National Engineers Week (Feb. 19-Feb. 25) and Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day (Feb. 23) by highlighting just a few of the more than 2,500 employees that make up the Lab’s Engineering Directorate. Representing a cross-section of the broad scope of focus areas and disciplines comprising the directorate, Engineering...

LLNL engineers make improvements to Lab-developed design optimization code

Lawrence Livermore National Laboraotry (LLNL) engineers have taken major strides towards closing the gap between the Lab’s manufacturing and design capabilities. The field of additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, has enabled the manufacturing of a variety of heretofore impossible designs — but some of this potential is left on the table because designers have had trouble keeping up with...

LLNL team demonstrates anisotropic explosive properties in key weapon safety study

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and engineers led a multi-institutional team in executing a series of high explosives tests that successfully demonstrated fundamental principles of anisotropy, a possible enabler for improved weapon and munition safety. Working under snowy and frigid conditions on Idaho’s Snake River Plain, a 13-member team from LLNL carried out...

LLNL, University of California initiative fosters academic partnership

A new joint initiative between the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Weapons and Complex Integration (WCI) Directorate and the University of California (UC) is aimed at developing next generation academic leadership with strong and enduring national laboratory connections.  The LLNL Early Career UC Faculty Initiative is accepting proposals from untenured, tenure-track...

W80-4 program achieves key review milestone

The W80-4 Life Extension Program team in November successfully executed the Preliminary Design Review and Acceptance Group (PDRAAG) review at the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center on Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Review by the PDRAAG is a critical mid-program review with the Department of Defense to show the warhead baseline design complies with DOD requirements...

LLNL physicist probes causes of life-shortening 'dwell fatigue' in titanium

"Dwell fatigue" is a phenomenon that can occur in titanium alloys when held under stress, such as a jet engine's fan disc during takeoff. This peculiar failure mode can initiate microscopic cracks that drastically reduce a component's lifetime.   The most widely used titanium alloy, Ti-6Al-4V, was not believed to exhibit dwell fatigue before the 2017 Air France Flight 066 incident, in...

LLNL scientists eagerly anticipate El Capitan’s potential impact

While Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is eagerly awaiting the arrival of its first exascale-class supercomputer, El Capitan, physicists and computer scientists running scientific applications on testbeds for the machine are getting a taste of what to expect. “I'm not exactly sure we’ve wrapped our head around exactly about how much compute power [El Capitan] is going to have...

The people of stockpile stewardship are the key to LLNL’s success

The last nuclear test, code-named Divider, took place 30 years ago, on Sept. 23, 1992. That year, President Bush declared a temporary moratorium on nuclear testing, which became permanent during the Clinton administration. This ending of the era of nuclear testing was also the beginning of stockpile stewardship. Leaders from the Department of Energy (DOE), and Lawrence Livermore, Los...

Scientific discovery for stockpile stewardship

Scientific discovery during the Stockpile Stewardship Program maintains confidence in the nuclear deterrent without testing, brings other benefits The last nuclear test, code-named Divider, took place 30 years ago, on September 23, 1992. That year, President Bush declared a temporary moratorium on nuclear testing, which became permanent during the Clinton administration. This...

Developing technology to keep the nuclear stockpile safe, secure and reliable

The last nuclear test, code-named Divider, took place 30 years ago, on Sept. 23, 1992. That year, President Bush declared a temporary moratorium on nuclear testing, which became permanent in 1995, during the Clinton administration. This ending of the era of nuclear testing coincided with a Presidential announcement of the beginning of stockpile stewardship. As the decision to...

Livermore researchers collect three awards among the top 100 industrial inventions

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists and engineers have garnered three awards among the top 100 industrial inventions worldwide. The trade journal R&D World Magazine recently announced the winners of the awards, often called the “Oscars of invention,” recognizing new commercial products, technologies and materials that are available for sale or license for their...

Manufacturing Day webinar to highlight HPC’s impact on climate change, energy efficiency

The High Performance Computing for Energy Innovation (HPC4EI) initiative will hold a special webinar on Oct. 7 to celebrate Manufacturing Day and provide a forum for industry experts and Department of Energy (DOE) scientists to discuss how HPC can help combat climate change and improve energy efficiency. The virtual event begins at 8 a.m. PDT and brings together panelists and speakers from...