and Quantum Optics Scientist
Audrey Eshun studies quantum optics, including ways to use quantum light to capture 3D images of sensitive biological samples, without damaging the sample. She’s excited to be part of LLNL’s quantum science initiatives and work in an emerging research area.
Audrey joined LLNL as a postdoctoral researcher after earning her degree in physical chemistry at the University of Michigan, and she converted to a staff scientist in 2024. In addition to building a quantum light source capable of taking 3D images, she and her team plan to enhance the tool so it can be used to study plant-microbiome interactions.
She works on another type of microscope, a lattice light sheet, which will enable researchers to view cells interacting with pathogens — helping them understand how viruses infect cells.
Her research extends beyond bioscience applications. She leverages her expertise in laser spectroscopy to study laser–material interaction, which supports LLNL’s fusion energy research.
Audrey grew up in Ghana and moved to the United States to start her undergraduate work. During college, she wanted to pursue energy research, and she’s happy that her work at LLNL involves both fusion energy and bioenergy applications.
Audrey also helps plan and promote events and participates in outreach activities with LLNL summer students, as well as local high school students. She hopes to inspire students to attend college, explore careers in science and maybe even pursue a career in quantum science.
Michael is equal parts scientist, mechanical engineer, software engineer and lab tech. He makes ideas a reality, facilitating the impossible by doing things that no one has done before.
Life at the Lab began for Michael as a graduate student and continued when he joined as a postdoc in 2016. He was brought on as a technical lead in the additive manufacturing of energetics, where he applied his diverse skillset to printing materials for the High Explosives Applications Facility (HEAF). He went on to help reactivate and upgrade a dedicated lab in the HEAF, which hosted several additive manufacturing firsts.
He played a key role in setting requirements and shepherding to completion the Facility for the Advanced Manufacturing of Energetics (FAME), where he now leads fabrication projects. Today, FAME is thriving, having grown from humble beginnings to creating many of the important parts that go into the greater whole here at the Lab.
Michael has been recognized with a WCI/WPD Silver Award for the “Conception, design and creation of FAME: a unique facility enabling energetics R&D.” He's also received a Bronze Award for “Outstanding performance in creating a new class of additively manufactured energetic materials.”
Elaine Lee is the group leader of the Responsive and Active Materials and Manufacturing Group and a member of the Center for Engineered Materials and Manufacturing in Engineering’s Materials Engineering Division. As a principal investigator, she provides solutions to multidisciplinary collaborative projects for the development of materials and methods to meet national security needs. Her research interests include stimuli-responsive materials, additive manufacturing processes, flexible optoelectronic technologies, electrophoretic deposition, microencapsulation, colloidal processing, micro- and nanofabrication and materials characterization. Elaine’s current projects span the Engineering, Physical and Life Sciences and Global Security directorates and include the development of controlled release of microencapsulants, engineered materials for flexible optoelectronic technologies and additive manufacturing of shape-changing materials. She will be co-leading a strategic initiative for enabling sentient materials.
Elaine earned her S.B. in materials science and engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and M.S. and Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from the University of Pennsylvania. She is a co-author on numerous high-impact publications and patents. Passionate about recruiting and mentoring, Elaine has received recognition for excellence in leadership, publishing and sponsor engagement.
Lara Leininger is the director of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Energetic Materials Center (EMC). The EMC is the central hub of LLNL’s energetics materials subject matter experts (SMEs) that integrates across programs and disciplines, and it is LLNL’s outreach to academia and industry. The EMC mission is to integrate state-of-the-art capabilities in high explosives, propellants, thermites and pyrotechnics for the benefit of the Department of Energy/National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) science-based Nuclear Stockpile Stewardship Program, the Department of Defense (DOD), Department of Homeland Security, U.S. government agencies and U.S. industry. LLNL conducts over 600 experiments annually at the High Explosives Applications Facility (HEAF) in Livermore, CA, and the Site 300 Experimental Site in Tracy, CA.
Lara joined Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 1997 and has held various roles throughout her career as a team member, subject matter expert and program manager supporting Strategic Deterrence, Global Security and Physical and Life Sciences. Her primary research interests are in failure modeling and assessment of structures and mechanical components under blast loading and reaction-zone physics in the detonations of high explosives. She has a broad customer base of NNSA, DOD and other government national security agencies.
From 2008–2010 Lara served as a managing engineer at Hinman Consulting Engineers, a firm that specialized in anti-terrorism/force protection structural engineering consulting for a range of customers. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Davis, an M.S. in mechanical engineering from Stanford University and B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara.
When she’s not in the lab, she combines her love of running with an overactive wanderlust, running marathons around the country in places she has not been to or had the time to explore. Since the country reopened after the COVID-19 pandemic her runs have included: Hartford, Baltimore, Columbus and Anchorage.
In addition to his role as a deputy group leader for LLNL’s Materials Science Division, Simon Pang leads the Direct Air Capture Pillar of LLNL’s Carbon Initiative. His research interests include development and deployment of materials and technologies for carbon dioxide removal, the interface between carbon capture and carbon conversion technologies, and systems analysis for carbon removal and energy technologies.
Simon leads research projects that explore understanding the fundamental chemical and physical interactions of direct air capture materials with their environment, as well as development of hybrid reactive capture processes that integrate carbon capture and conversion. He is an author of LLNL’s landmark report, Getting to Neutral, which identified potential pathways for California to achieve an environmentally neutral energy footprint. Simon is also an author of LLNL’s Roads to Removal report, which provides a national geospatial assessment of the options that can enable the United States to achieve a sustainable, low life-cycle approach that minimizes environmental impacts.
Simon received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Colorado Boulder and a B.S. in chemical engineering from Cornell University. He is a recipient of LLNL’s ninth annual early and mid-career award, for which he credits his team of incredible students, postdocs, and staff.
Viktor Sukhotskiy is a research and development engineer in the Materials Engineering Division. Viktor specializes in bridging the gap between simulations and experiments through joint multiphysics modeling and hands-on prototyping and development. Viktor continuously seeks to add depth and breadth to his expertise in this area by prioritizing both practical results and system understanding.
Currently, he works on process development of powder- and laser-free additive manufacturing using liquid metal jetting, a cutting-edge metal droplet-based technology. Viktor is currently a principal investigator for an Exploratory Research Laboratory Directed Research and Development project called PowderJet, where his team is applying liquid metal jetting to feedstock production.
Before joining LLNL, Viktor spent time at the New York-based startup Vader Systems and then Xerox, where he was part of a team that researched, developed and deployed the world’s first commercial liquid metal jetting 3D printer, named the ElemX.
Viktor is an interdisciplinary researcher, co-authoring 10 publications across fields such as additive manufacturing, nanophotonics, printed electronics, metal jetting and magnetohydrodynamics. Viktor holds eight patents in additive manufacturing technologies, with three more patents pending. He earned his Ph.D., M.S. and B.S. in electrical engineering from the University at Buffalo.
Energetic Materials
Energetic materials, particularly high explosives, play an integral role in the U.S. nuclear deterrent, and LLNL expertise in this arena also informs counterterrorism assessments. Our researchers pair high-fidelity modeling and simulation with hands-on formulation, synthesis and experimentation to propel scientific advances in energetic materials. Our researchers are also driving advances in high explosive manufacturing technologies, including additive manufacturing and continuous synthesis.
Shape-Shifting Materials React and Respond to Stimuli
Using a doped ink formulation, researchers are developing a class of materials known as liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) that can change when exposed to force, heat and light. LCEs respond in programmed ways to select stimuli, with structures that can change and reverse their shape, wiggle similarly to an organism, change colors and more. Through advances in 3D-printing technology, material chemistry and design optimization, the LCEs’ responses pave the way for “sentient” materials that can remember mechanical responses, make decisions and even redesign themselves.
Accelerating Materials Discovery
In an evolving national security landscape, researchers need specially-tuned materials to build new technologies. In response, LLNL researchers are transforming and accelerating the materials discovery and manufacturing process to meet mission needs. For example, they are designing new thermally stable alloys with the strength and performance needed to function in extreme environments, including hypersonic, nuclear stockpile and fusion energy applications. They use the Lab’s supercomputers and physics-based models to rapidly identify the best solutions, evaluating factors such as the material’s corrosion resistance, radiation response and ability to be fabricated using additive manufacturing.
AML
Advanced Manufacturing Laboratory
The Advanced Manufacturing Laboratory facilitates partnerships between LLNL, industry and academia to address manufacturing challenges across a range of commercial and government projects.
CAMS
Center for Mass Spectrometry
CAMS researchers use diverse analytical techniques and state-of-the-art instrumentation to develop and apply ultra-sensitive isotope ratio measurements and ion beam analytical techniques.
CDO
Center for Design Optimization
CDO optimizes complex systems governed by the nonlinear, dynamic, multiphysics or multiresolution phenomena afforded by advanced manufacturing technologies.
CEMM
Center for Engineered Materials and Manufacturing
CEMM develops new additive manufacturing capabilities for micro- and nanoscale features and mixed materials, which are used to fabricate architected materials with unique properties.
CFF
Contained Firing Facility
The Contained Firing Facility (CFF) handles large-scale, non-nuclear, hydrodynamic experiments with full containment of hazardous materials. Unique diagnostics record experimental results for nuclear weapons and explosives research and development.
EMC
Energetic Materials Center
The Energetic Materials Center conducts research and development on the performance of high explosives in support of the Laboratory’s defense, nuclear deterrence and homeland security missions.
HEAF
High Explosives Applications Facility
The High Explosives Applications Facility (HEAF) integrates the operations of synthesis, formulation and testing of explosive materials in a single, synergistic facility.
LEAF
The Laboratory for Energy Applications for the Future
The Laboratory for Energy Applications for the Future (LEAF) connects multidisciplinary efforts across LLNL to explore materials solutions for pressing energy challenges.
Livermore Center for Quantum Science
The Livermore Center for Quantum Science fosters a thriving quantum research community at LLNL, enabling multidisciplinary teams to harness the power of quantum-enabled technology to solve increasingly complex national security challenges.
PE
Polymer Enclave
The Polymer Enclave accelerates the design-to-deployment of additively manufactured weapon components critical to modernizing the U.S. nuclear stockpile.
