Materials Science

Results 26–50 of 137
Date Inputs. Currently set to enter a start and end date.
Current Filters Clear all

Sandia scientist to lead materials science organization

February 21, 2022 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Brad Boyce, a materials scientist at Sandia National Laboratories, was elected president of The Minerals, Metals and Materials Society. Boyce will become vice president of the society on March 3 at its annual meeting, and then serve three consecutive one-year terms as vice president, president and past...
Categories: Awards, Materials Science
Brad Boyce watches a yellow commercial robot scan a 3D-printed test part with blue light.

Powerful Sandia machine-learning model shows diamond melting at high pressure

January 26, 2022 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A Sandia National Laboratories supercomputer simulation model called SNAP that rapidly predicts the behavior of billions of interacting atoms has captured the melting of diamond when compressed by extreme pressures and temperatures. At several million atmospheres, the rigid carbon lattice of the hardest known substance on Earth...

Program in fusion energy attracted interns’ eyes

December 9, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.— A bold plan paid off this past summer when Sandia National Laboratories staff members LaRico Treadwell and Khalid Hattar combined their passions for increasing inclusion of people of color with developing materials to eventually derive energy from nuclear fusion. Standing to benefit from the pilot project were three...
Eryal Reinhart, a summer intern at Sandia National Laboratories, is considering switching her major from engineering to materials science.

Remote high-voltage sensor unveiled at Sandia gamma ray lab

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,...
Sandia National Laboratories researcher Israel Owens holds the optical sensor used to house the crystal that proved central to his team’s successful attempts to measure very high voltages. The two red spots on each side of the crystal are due to laser light reflecting off the side mirrors used to direct light through the middle of the crystal. The actual experiments used green laser light.

Sandia researcher awarded Early-Career Research Program grant

October 11, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Working to solve a problem, supercomputing researchers may encounter incomplete data or flawed programs. For both issues, Sandia researcher Drew Kouri has attracted interest from the broad computing community for his ability to mitigate uncertainty in both supercomputer programs and data, optimizing each to reach the best...

High-speed alloy creation might revolutionize hydrogen’s future

September 20, 2021 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — A Sandia National Laboratories team of materials scientists and computer scientists, with some international collaborators, have spent more than a year creating 12 new alloys — and modeling hundreds more — that demonstrate how machine learning can help accelerate the future of hydrogen energy by making it...

Look who’s turning 25

September 2, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories is celebrating 25 years of research conducted at its Z Pulsed Power Facility — a gymnasium-sized accelerator commonly referred to as Z or the Z machine. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, only a limited number of former leaders of the pulsed power program at Sandia...
Topics: , , ,

The hidden culprit killing lithium-metal batteries from the inside

July 14, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — For decades, scientists have tried to make reliable lithium-metal batteries. These high-performance storage cells hold 50% more energy than their prolific, lithium-ion cousins, but higher failure rates and safety problems like fires and explosions have crippled commercialization efforts. Researchers have hypothesized why the devices fail, but direct...
Battery Team

Setting gold and platinum standards where few have gone before

June 24, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Like two superheroes finally joining forces, Sandia National Laboratories’ Z machine — generator of the world’s most powerful electrical pulses — and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility — the planet’s most energetic laser source — in a series of 10 experiments have detailed the responses...

Using a mineral ‘sponge’ to catch uranium

June 9, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A team of researchers from Sandia, Lawrence Berkeley and Pacific Northwest national laboratories tested a “sponge-like” mineral that can “soak up” uranium at a former uranium mill near Rifle, Colorado. The researchers found that the mineral, calcium apatite, soaks up and binds uranium from the groundwater, reducing...
Graphic of underground stream with uranium being absorbed by apatite with detection wells upstream and downstream.

Experimental Impact Mechanics Lab at Sandia bars none

May 25, 2021, Media Advisory • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — There’s a tiny hidden gem at Sandia National Laboratories that tests the strength and evaluates the impact properties of any solid natural or manmade material on the planet. From its humble beginnings as a small storage room, mechanical engineer Bo Song has built a singular Experimental Impact...
EIML Bo Song

Thin explosive films provide snapshot of how detonations start

March 4, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Using thin films — no more than a few pieces of notebook paper thick — of a common explosive chemical, researchers from Sandia National Laboratories studied how small-scale explosions start and grow. Sandia is the only lab in the U.S. that can make such detonatable thin films....
Black and white image of an explosive shockwave and a video play button.

Black engineer awards expand Sandia Labs spotlight

March 3, 2021 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Ten Sandia National Laboratories engineers received Black Engineer of the Year Awards, including Most Promising Scientist, Modern Technology Leaders and Science Spectrum Trailblazers. Honorees include Sandia systems, chemical, computer, electrical, petroleum, manufacturing and mechanical engineers who excel in their respective fields, powering innovation while flexing their technological...

Material found in house paint may spur technology revolution

October 14, 2020 • LIVERMORE, Calif. — The development of a new method to make non-volatile computer memory may have unlocked a problem that has been holding back machine learning and has the potential to revolutionize technologies like voice recognition, image processing and autonomous driving. A team from Sandia National Laboratories, working with collaborators...

50 million artificial neurons to facilitate machine-learning research at Sandia

October 2, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Fifty million artificial neurons — a number roughly equivalent to the brain of a small mammal — were delivered from Portland, Oregon-based Intel Corp. to Sandia National Laboratories last month, said Sandia project leader Craig Vineyard. The neurons will be assembled to advance a relatively new kind...

Basic laws of physics spruce up machine learning

August 6, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A proposed project to help scientists use the laws of physics to view multiscale physical events with a clarity never before achieved has won an Early Career Research Program award from the Department of Energy for Sandia National Laboratories researcher Nathaniel Trask. Such work may require observations...
Nat Trask

Company moves metals characterization technology forward with help from Sandia Labs

May 20, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — When a small business needed help proving that its invention, a tabletop laser system, could characterize metals faster and more easily than current equipment, they turned to Sandia National Laboratories’ expertise in metals characterization. Sandia’s testing verified that Albuquerque-based Advanced Optical Technologies’ patented Crystallographic Polarization-Classification Imaging, or...

Radiation-detecting plastic gets ingredient to stay in the clear

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 through the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s radiation detectors. The change also fits well...
Nick Myllenbeck, a materials scientist at Sandia National Laboratories, examines glowing plastic used to detect radioactive material. (Photo by Lloyd Wilson) Click on the thumbnail for a high-resolution image.

A material benefit to society, Sandia scientist elected AAAS fellow

February 3, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A perennial inventor of advanced materials has been elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Sandia National Laboratories senior scientist Tina Nenoff was bestowed the honor by her peers for the advancement of science “in service to society” and “for outstanding accomplishments in...
Tina Nenoff

Sandia Fellow wins nuclear fusion award

January 16, 2020 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories Fellow Keith Matzen has been awarded the 2019 Distinguished Career Award by Fusion Power Associates, a national nonprofit research and educational foundation, for his many contributions to the laboratory development of nuclear fusion. The foundation annually brings together senior U.S. and international fusion experts...
Photo of Keith Matzen

Sandia establishes collaborative research facility for low-temperature plasmas

December 20, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Sandia National Laboratories is setting up a collaborative facility to help researchers worldwide study low-temperature plasmas, the most pervasive state of matter in the universe. The 5-year, $5.5 million project, called the Sandia Low Temperature Plasma Research Facility, is sponsored by the Department of Energy’s Office of...

AI center to combine hardware, software for practical gains

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...
Graphic for ARIAA

National Hispanic science and engineering organization honors two Sandia researchers

October 22, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Materials scientist Nic Argibay and health and safety senior manager Rafael Gonzalez were honored at the 31st annual Hispanic Engineer National Achievement Awards Conference by Great Minds in STEM, a nonprofit organization that recognizes Hispanic leadership and achievement in science, technology, engineering and math. Argibay received a...
Nicolas Argibay

Engineering success by predicting failure

October 16, 2019 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Since people started forging and working with metal, they’ve arguably been interested in how it breaks. But only since the 1950s have scientists and engineers had a mathematical framework for using laboratory measurements of material failure to predict a structure’s resistance to cracking. “These tools work well...
**
Results 26–50 of 137