August 19, 2026 • The nuclear security enterprise, including Sandia, partnering with the U.S. Navy, completed the first production unit of the W76 Mark 4B reentry body nearly three months ahead of schedule.
August 17, 2026 • A semitrailer loaded with mock nuclear weapons slammed into a barrier, completing the second and final full-scale crash test of the Mobile Guardian Transporter. The next-generation system will carry nuclear weapons and other sensitive materials.
April 23, 2025 • Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have spent the last three years developing an ultra-low-power chemical sensor to detect sarin and other chemical warfare agents or gaseous industrial toxins, aiming to protect the public and warfighters.
May 9, 2022 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — Imagine moving through airport security without having to take off your shoes or belt or getting pulled aside while your flight boards — while keeping all the precautions that ensure the safety of passengers and flight crews. This is the challenge tackled by a team including researchers...
December 15, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have developed a method to detect trace amounts of synthetic opioids. They plan to combine their approach with miniaturized sensors to create a hand-portable instrument easily used by law enforcement agents for efficient detection in the field. Fentanyl is a fast-acting, opioid-based...
November 10, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Ever since the first human placed a bare hand on an uninsulated electric line, people have refrained from personally testing energetic materials. Even meters made of metal can melt at high voltages. Now, using a crystal smaller than a dime and a laser smaller than a shoebox,...
September 22, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Shovels symbolically speared the ground today at the site of Sandia National Laboratories new $42.5 million Emergency Operations Center.The 25,000-square-foot complex located on Kirtland Air Force Base is expected to be operational by spring 2023. The c…
September 9, 2021 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — Every day at ports of entry, hundreds of thousands of vehicles and containers cross into the country. Since 9/11, all incoming vehicles and containers at land crossings, rail crossings, mail facilities and shipping terminals are scanned by Customs and B…
July 22, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Behold the neutron, the middle child of subatomic particles. At times overshadowed by its electrically charged siblings the proton and the electron, neutrons quietly play important roles in national security. They start nuclear reactions for weapons and power plants. They bombard materials for nuclear safety tests. And...
November 12, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Radioactive materials are attractive targets to thieves and other bad actors. These are rare finds, valuable on the black market and relatively easy to weaponize. New security professionals rarely learn practical skills for protecting these targets until they are on the job at nuclear power plants, research...
October 8, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A full-scale crash test involving a semitruck impacting the side of the first prototype of a new weapons transporter successfully took place at Sandia National Laboratories this summer.[caption id="" align="alignright" width="250"] Data from the Mobile …
May 26, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — This spring, Sandia National Laboratories anticipates being one of the first Department of Energy laboratories to receive the newest A64FX Fujitsu processor, a Japanese Arm-based processor optimized for high-performance computing. Arm-based processors are used widely in small electronic devices like cell phones. More recently, Arm-based processors were...
April 30, 2020 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have identified a straightforward change to the formula for radiation-detecting plastic. The change prevents “fogging,” which reduces the lifetime of the plastics used to detect nuclear material transiting…
March 23, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — To deter attempts to disable U.S. electrical utilities and to defend U.S. nuclear weapon systems from evolving technological threats, Sandia National Laboratories has begun two multiyear initiatives to strengthen U.S. responses. One is focused on defending large U.S. electrical utility systems from potential attacks by hostile nations,...
March 9, 2020 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — As the threats posed by bioterrorism and naturally occurring infectious disease grow and evolve in the modern era, there is a rising potential for broad negative impacts on human health, economic stability and global security. To protect the nation from…
February 25, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories robotics experts are working on a way to intercept enemy unmanned aircraft systems midflight. They successfully tested their concept indoors with a swarm of four unmanned aircraft systems that flew in unison, each carrying o…
October 31, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington, and the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta are launching a research center that combines hardware design and software development to improve artificial intelligence technologies that will ultimately benefit the public. AI is an emerging field with...
January 7, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Quantum computing is a term that periodically flashes across the media sky like heat lightning in the desert: brilliant, attention-getting and then vanishing from the public’s mind with no apparent aftereffects. Yet a multimillion dollar international effort to build quantum computers is hardly going away. And now,...
January 2, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — When people are in the early stages of an undiagnosed disease, immediate tests that lead to treatment are the best first steps. But a blood draw — usually performed by a medical professional armed with an uncomfortably large needle — might not be quickest, least painful or...
December 6, 2018 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — An electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, emitted by a nuclear weapon exploded high above the United States could disable the electronic circuits of many devices vital to military defense and modern living. These could include complicated weapon systems as well as phones, laptops, credit cards and car computers....
November 28, 2018 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Decades ago, technical experts from the national labs responded in an ad hoc manner to accidents involving nuclear weapons, called “broken arrows.” Thirty-two such accidents have occurred since the 1950s, so the Accident Response Group was created about five decades ago to provide technical expertise in assessing...
August 1, 2018 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Using an artful combination of nanotechnology and basic chemistry, Sandia National Laboratories researchers have encouraged gold nanoparticles to self-assemble into unusually large supercrystals that could significantly improve the detection sensitivity for chemicals in explosives or drugs. “Our supercrystals have more sensing capability than regular spectroscopy instruments currently...
November 29, 2017 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. —The Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky once postulated that the devil no longer uses fire and brimstone but instead simply tells you what you want to hear.Sandia National Laboratories cyber researchers go with that second option when it comes to foiling…
October 24, 2017 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The world is becoming increasingly interconnected. While this has definite advantages, it also makes it easier to spread disease. Many diseases don’t produce symptoms for days or weeks, far longer than international flight times. For example, Ebola has an incubation period of two to 21 days. Improving...