Back
Space security
LLNL delivers advanced gamma-ray spectrometer for NASA’s Dragonfly mission to explore Titan
Hundreds of millions of miles away from Earth, the landscape of Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, bears a striking resemblance to our own planet — but with dunes of hydrocarbon sands rather than silica sands, and rain, rivers, lakes and seas of liquid methane and ethane rather than liquid water. The NASA Dragonfly mission is set to explore this world in unprecedented detail…
Mission challenge ideas day turns bold concepts into space security capabilities
Exploring new frontiers of space requires innovative approaches to anticipate and identify paths for integrating space domain awareness capabilities. To deliver solutions for these emergent challenges, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s (LLNL) Global Security Directorate recently hosted a “Space LDRD Ideas Day.” Researchers from a broad range of disciplines attended…
NNSA Administrator Williams visits LLNL to discuss stockpile modernization, AI and future deterrence
U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Under Secretary for Nuclear Security and Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Brandon Williams visited Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) Feb. 9 for briefings and tours focused on stockpile modernization, AI, supercomputing and the future of deterrence. During the visit, Williams met with LLNL…
Simulations and supercomputing calculate one million orbits in cislunar space
Satellites and spacecraft in the vast region between the earth and moon and just beyond — called cislunar space — are crucial for space exploration, scientific advancement and national security. But figuring out where exactly to put them into a stable orbit can be a huge, computationally expensive challenge. In an open-access database and with publicly available code,…
What is dark matter? Explore the possibilities in the Big Ideas Lab podcast
Galaxies spin faster than they should. Clusters of those galaxies hold themselves intact against all expectations. By every visible measure, the universe should not look the way it does. Something is holding galaxies, stars and entire clusters together. Something we can’t see. And although it’s invisible to the naked eye, there are clues everywhere that allude to its…
Walk in the shoes of an offsite fellow with the Big Ideas Lab podcast
Walk through any federal building and you might spot them. A Livermore face among the crowd. Not visitors. Not consultants. Fellows. Some are sent to Washington, others remain local in Silicon Valley, and a select few even concentrate their efforts toward the final frontier: space. But whether D.C. or deep space, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) brings its…
LZ dark matter experiment sets a world’s best and spots neutrinos from the sun’s core
There’s more to the universe than meets the eye. Dark matter, the invisible substance that accounts for 85 percent of the mass in the universe, is hiding all around us — and figuring out exactly what it is remains one of the biggest questions about how our world works. The newest results from LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) extend the experiment’s search for low-mass dark matter and set…
Meteorite samples are time capsules from the early solar system
When a meteor streaks across the sky, it’s not just beautiful. It’s nature’s way of delivering a time capsule to Earth. Contained within are hints about the very beginning of the solar system and how planets, including our own, formed. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientist Thomas Kruijer and collaborators describe how meteorites tell the story of the…
Experiments show how water could form on exoplanets, disrupting current theories
In the search for extraterrestrial life, the presence of water is a key signature of possible habitability. Identifying why some planets are wet and others are dry could help with the hunt. In a recent study published in Nature, scientists including Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) postdoctoral researcher Harrison Horn demonstrate a novel pathway for producing…
LLNL’s Wei Jia Ong receives American Physical Society’s 2025 Freedman Award
Wei Jia Ong, a staff scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), has been recognized as the recipient of the American Physical Society’s (APS) 2025 Stuart Jay Freedman Award in Experimental Nuclear Physics. The award is presented annually to an outstanding early career experimentalist in nuclear physics. Ong was selected for her work “spearheading a…
LLNL research rewrites a chapter of the Moon’s early history
When Apollo 17 astronauts collected a small rock from the Moon more than 50 years ago, they had no way of knowing it would still be challenging scientists’ understanding of lunar history today. The fragment, known as sample 76535, formed nearly 50 kilometers underground but shows almost no signs of the violent shocks usually expected when deep rocks are blasted to the…
Big Ideas Lab podcast explores the world’s largest camera
During the next decade, the world’s newest telescope will detect about 20 billion galaxies, representing the first time a telescope will observe more galaxies than there are people on Earth. LLNL researchers designed the major optical components for the telescope camera, called the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) camera and part of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory…
Big Ideas Lab Podcast looks back at the laser guide star
Late one evening about 30 years ago, a beam of light shot into the sky from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), creating confusion and awe in the surrounding community. It wasn’t a UFO, as some people feared, but the start of a revolution in astronomy. That beam of a light was a demonstration of the laser guide star, which would go on to light up the night sky…
LLNL and Starris sign agreement, schedule conference talk for Aug. 13
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and Starris: Optimax Space Systems have signed a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA), expanding production of LLNL’s next-generation space domain awareness technology. Starris will serve as the manufacturing partner that can scale production of monolithic telescope technology to meet the needs for…
LLNL selected by Defense Innovation Unit to build Pathfinder telescope for space vehicles
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has been selected by the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) to provide a new monolithic telescope for a responsive space mission that will launch as early as 2027. Firefly Aerospace will host and operate the payload onboard its Elytra orbital vehicle during the mission in low Earth orbit (LEO), the area…
LLNL’s high-resolution telescope system to usher in a new era of lunar exploration
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is playing a pivotal role supporting a groundbreaking lunar imaging effort in collaboration with Firefly Aerospace. A LLNL state-of-the-art telescope system will be deployed onboard Firefly’s Elytra orbital vehicle to enable Firefly’s new Ocula imaging service, as early as 2026. This marks the first planned commercial lunar…
LLNL will host watch party on June 23 to unveil Rubin Observatory’s first images
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory will release its first set of images on June 23, 2025. The achievement marks the beginning of a new era in astronomy, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) will be part of the action as it hosts a first look watch party for both staff and the public. Anyone is welcome to attend the watch party at the University of California…
Space security advances for the Big Ideas Lab podcast
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s (LLNL) contributions to space security are the topic of the newest Big Ideas Lab Podcast series. Listen on Apple and Spotify. Ben Bahney, the leader of the Lab’s Space Science and Security Program, calls space security the idea that the U.S. needs to find a way to operate in space despite the presence of natural threats to…
All ears on the Big Ideas Lab podcast
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) has big ideas and is showing the world in the Big Ideas Lab weekly podcast that takes listeners behind the fences and into its heart. “This is where big ideas come to life,” said Lab Director Kim Budil. “To do this, we bring together dynamic teams of many different disciplines — laser physicists and materials scientists and…
Deep Purple payload successfully deployed and operational
The Deep Purple telescope developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) researchers is now operational in space. The Livermore instrument, which utilizes a new design for an ultra-violet (UV) and short-wave infrared monolithic telescope features a novel, compact optical system and electronics package inside a lightweight, modular housing. On Friday, Aug. 16,…
