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Engineering
LLNL signs agreement with maker of big data software
The Laboratory will evaluate the topological data analysis software produced by Ayasdi for tackling big data problems under a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed at LLNL Thursday.Ayasdi's Insight Discovery platform uses Topological Data Analysis (TDA) combined with an ensemble of machine learning techniques to enable data scientists, domain experts and business people…
Artificial retina: Invention of the year
The artificial retina, in which Lawrence Livermore has played a prominent role, has earned a place in the top 25 best inventions of the year 2013 from Time Magazine.The invention also has garnered a 2013 best innovation designation by Popular Science .This Department of Energy funded project resulted in the creation of the first-ever retinal prosthesis -- or bionic eye --…
Lawrence Livermore researchers unveil carbon nanotube jungles to better detect molecules
LIVERMORE, Calif. - Researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich have developed a new method of using nanotubes to detect molecules at extremely low concentrations enabling trace detection of biological threats, explosives and drugs. The joint research team, led by LLNL Engineer Tiziana Bond…
LLNL wins four tech transfer regional awards
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has again received recognition this year for its work to move breakthrough technologies into the commercial marketplace.Livermore researchers and tech transfer professionals garnered four awards in the Federal Laboratory Consortium's (FLC) Far West Regional competition.This year's awards, presented last week during the FLC's…
Livermore team successfully leads important test of a conventional warhead for the DoD
LLNL served as technical lead and integrator on an important test to assess a new conventional warhead designed by the Lab. Dave Hare, Livermore's program manager of the test, called it an "unequivocal success." Below is the press release from the Department of Defense Defense Department successfully conducts warhead sled test The Defense Department announced recently the…
Lab engineer brings science and technology to Bay Area youth
Victor Castillo is focused on helping students succeed using his favorite tools: science and technology.The quantitative risk analysis group leader at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Computational Engineering Division has spent many years giving back to the Bay Area community through youth development.In his free time, he mentors students in science and…
Lab researcher Harry Martz makes flying safer for Americans
Each time you step on a commercial flight, you can feel safer because of a researcher you've probably never heard of. His name is Harry Martz. He's a veteran scientist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) who wakes up every day thinking how his research can advance X-ray imaging technology to thwart the next terrorist attack. See the video .Plainspoken and…
Building a scientific and engineering base in Qatar
After working at Oak Ridge National Laboratory for nearly his entire career, Thomas Zacharia decided last year that it was time for a change.The former ORNL deputy director for science and technology in Tennessee, Zacharia assumed the reins of a new job last August as the executive vice-president for R&D at the Qatar Foundation in the heart of the Middle East, some 7…
Lab machinists graduate from the Machinists Apprentice Program
Tyler Paniagua and Sam Wickizer are engineers' best friends. They are machinists who spend countless hours in the shop making research tools and products that engineers and other scientists depend on to conduct innovative research.Their hard work was honored late last month when they graduated from the LLNL Engineering Directorate 's Machinist Apprentice Program. It's a…
Lawrence Livermore engineering team makes breakthrough in solar energy research
LIVERMORE, Calif. - The use of plasmonic black metals could someday provide a pathway to more efficient photovoltaics (PV) -- the use of solar panels containing photovoltaic solar cells -- to improve solar energy harvesting, according to researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).The LLNL Materials Engineering Division (MED) research team has made…
Lawrence Livermore celebrates 25 years of carbon dating
From developing the first accelerator mass spectrometer for use in the biology field to tracking radionuclides from the Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant disaster, the Laboratory's Center for Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (CAMS) has spent 25 years in the spotlight of not only dating ancient artifacts but solving global challenges.CAMS is celebrating its 25th anniversary this…
Lawrence Livermore captures five R&D 100 awards
LIVERMORE, Calif.--Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researchers are the recipients of five awards among the top 100 industrial innovations worldwide in 2012. The five technologies honored by the trade journal R&D Magazine were developed by three teams of LLNL scientists and engineers, a team of Lab physicists and two LLNL computational scientists who worked with…
Nine scientists named Distinguished Members of Technical Staff
Nine Laboratory scientists have joined the ranks of 14 other researchers by being named members of the Lab's 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. Maya Gokhale of the Computation Directorate, Ernst…
Advanced manufacturing key to economic vitality, Lab hosted forum concludes
"Plastics!" That was the career advice offered to the new college graduate played by Dustin Hoffman in the 1967 film "The Graduate."Today that would likely be "additive manufacturing" or "3D printing." That was the underlying theme to last week's "Additive Manufacturing Forum" sponsored by the California Network for Manufacturing Innovation (CNMI) and hosted by Lawrence…
Faculty members of HBCUs visit Lab
The Laboratory hosted 18 faculty members from 14 of the nation's Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) last week during a joint visit sponsored by the Department of Energy's Office of Economic Impact and Diversity. A number of local business members and entrepreneurs also participated in the meeting. The goal of the meeting was initially to increase the…
100th shot for LLNL's 'gun in the desert'
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's JASPER gas gun has fired its 100th shot. JASPER (the Joint Actinide Shock Physics Experimental Research) is a key scientific tool for the National Nuclear Security Administration's Stockpile Stewardship Program (SSP). This program's combination of computer simulations, scientific theory and above-ground experiments has allowed the…
The Laboratory enters the additive manufacturing arena
Additive manufacturing. You'll be hearing a lot more of those two words in the coming months and years at LLNL. Additive manufacturing (AM) is a new generation of technologies that were actually first developed during the 1970s. But AM has recently become more mainstream with the advent of advances in materials, sensors, micromechanics, computational modeling and…
Lawrence Livermore wins six R&D Awards for science, technological innovation
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory researchers have won six awards for their efforts in developing breakthrough technologies with commercial potential. See video . R&D Magazine announced the winners of its annual R&D 100 Awards, sometimes called the "Oscars of Invention" on Wednesday. The awards will be presented Nov. 1 during a black-tie dinner at the SeaWorld…
Dickerson wins uplifting competition
Not long after her return from Cyprus where she set world records, Mercedes Dickerson began imagining her next goal -- setting more records in the Ukraine next year and then in Italy two years from now. In October, Dickerson set seven International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) Masters world records in Limassol, Cyprus, in categories of her weight (75+ kg) and age group …
Compression experiments lead to shocking results
LIVERMORE, Calif. -- Using acceleration 1 trillion times faster than a jet fighter in a maximum turn, researchers have gained new insight into dynamic compression of aluminum at ultrahigh strain rates. Controlled shock compression has been used for decades to examine the behavior of materials under extreme conditions of pressure and temperature. Using an ultrafast…
