Science / Technology / Engineering

September 15, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- By interlocking tiny slivers of silicon into a lattice that, under a microscope, appears to be formed by toy Lincoln Logs, scientists at the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories believe they have solved a major technical problem: how to bend...

September 1, 1998 • MAMMOTH LAKES, CALIF. -- Resumed drilling at the Long Valley Exploratory Well near Mammoth Lakes, Calif., may provide new clues about local volcanic hazards and the role of underground magma in the energy future of California. The drilling operations are being led by a team...

August 21, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Fewer failures in satellites used for everything from communications to surveillance may be the result of bipolar electronics reliability tests developed by Sandia National Laboratories, a Department of Energy (DOE) national security research lab, and a...

August 3, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, NM -- The Cold War has been over for more than seven years, but most Americans continue to believe the U.S. remains at risk of nuclear conflict, and they support maintenance of a stockpile of nuclear weapons to ensure the safety of the country.

July 16, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- In a few years a dime-size microchip may be home to as many as 10 million transistors. But the electrical resistance created as all those snug circuits zap electrons back and forth are causing even today's tightly packaged microprocessors to get...

July 16, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Humanity has valued seashells for their beauty as ornaments and utility as tools for thousands of years. But even alchemists never tried transmuting base materials into the very fine interlayering necessary to create a shell's strength, hardness, and...

July 7, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, NM -- Within the next few years, your watch, television, and computer may all contain microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), micron-size machines being developed at Sandia National Laboratories, a Department of Energy national security lab.

June 16, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- In the presence of wheelchair-bound Bill "Willie" Shoemaker -- America's winningest jockey until he suffered a severe spinal injury in an auto accident in 1991 -- representatives of the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories signed a $5.76...

June 10, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, NM -- Work being done at the Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories to determine the reliability of Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) may mean that one day soon most electronics devices will contain the micron-size machines.

June 3, 1998 • LIVERMORE, Calif. -- Leo Mara usually commutes on foot the two miles from his home to work at Sandia National Laboratories. But one day, as he inched along a bumpy road in his van past a repair crew, he dreamed of a bus-sized vehicle that would fix potholes as it...

May 21, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- If frozen food thawed on the cross-country truck transporting it, was then refrozen and you bought it, how would you know the food wasn't fit to eat?

May 14, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Sandia National Laboratories' role in helping the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) design a systematic new approach to aircraft safety was highlighted during a May 13 Washington, D.C., news conference. The FAA expects the new program to help its team...

May 14, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Albuquerque's growing reputation as a high-tech magnet gains another level May 28-29 with a conference introducing the captains of high-tech America to the proposed Sandia Science and Technology Park.

May 5, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Steven Spielberg's new blockbuster movie -- with its computer-animated interpretation of a comet striking Earth -- promises to be a big hit at the box office this summer. But computer scientists at Sandia National Laboratories are creating some big hits of...

May 1, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A recent Sandia National Laboratories' double-blind test of an instrument that its manufacturer said could detect the presence of human beings at a distance through any material found no evidence that it could do so.

April 29, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Research under way in Sandia National Laboratories' Geothermal Research Department may improve the economic feasibility of using geothermal energy -- water heated deep inside the earth's crust -- to produce electricity.

April 23, 1998 • LIVERMORE, Calif. -- Extending our senses beyond their current limits, bits of hardware may one day discern the faint but informative presence of trace chemicals while mounted on bands of small vehicles that cooperatively canvass the countryside.

April 17, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Sandia National Laboratories has expanded its partnership with Pacific Scientific Company to manufacture, test, and supply vital components for national defense weapons systems. Sandia and Pacific Scientific officials celebrated the expanded partnership at...

April 10, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- The Hispanic Engineer and Information Technology Magazine has recognized Sandia National Laboratories engineers Dr. Dan Arvizu, Director of Materials and Process Science Center, and Dr. Nestor Ortiz, Director of Nuclear Energy Technology Center, and former...

April 8, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Eliminate stress, the saying goes, and you live longer. Apparently the same is true of certain diamond coatings.

April 8, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Permission to prepare a conceptual design for an accelerator, X-1, has been formally requested by Sandia National Laboratories President Paul Robinson in a letter to the Department of Energy (DOE).

March 27, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- A device expected to be potentially less expensive and more effective than any on the market in helping cool silicon wafers during the chip manufacturing process has been patented in prototype by researchers at Sandia National Laboratories.

March 17, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Some 180 internationally known experts representing the United Nations, NATO, and about 40 countries will gather here April 3-5 to discuss how to deal with the spread of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons and the technologies required to monitor them.

March 2, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories' Z machine -- the former dark horse among accelerators meant to produce conditions required for nuclear fusion -- have increased the machine's X-ray power output by nearly 10 times in the last two years.

March 2, 1998 • ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Sandia National Laboratories President and Director C. Paul Robinson has been elected a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), one of the highest distinctions accorded an engineer.