FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 16, 2006

National nanotechnology core facility to be dedicated in Albuquerque Aug. 23

Sandia, Los Alamos national labs combine skills to keep U.S. in forefront of new field of very small things

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A ceremony to dedicate the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies (CINT) Core Facility will take place Wednesday, Aug. 23, at 10:30 a.m. at the CINT facility located on the west side of Eubank Boulevard just north of Kirtland Air Force Base.

CINT is the only research center run jointly by Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories. The 96,000-square-foot CINT Core Facility will be a distribution point for researchers best served at smaller “gateways” at LANL and Sandia.

The building’s curved front wall of stacked stone, hundreds of feet long, symbolically links New Mexico’s history of innovation by Native Americans at Chaco Canyon, nearly a thousand years ago, with that emerging from today’s labs.

Those scheduled to speak include Sens. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M.; Clay Sell, deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy; Terry Wallace, Los Alamos National Laboratory principal associate director, and Sandia President and Labs Director Tom Hunter. Other dignitaries from the National Nuclear Security Administration and DOE will be present.

Media are invited to attend. B-roll video images of nanomaterials — showing actual experiments as well as sophisticated computer models — will be available on DVD to supplement images of the unusual building and attending dignitaries.

Please call Michelle Fleming at (505) 844-4902 by 3 p.m., Tuesday, Aug. 22, to be placed on an entrance list for the ceremony and to receive a parking pass.

The CINT Core Facility is the only permanent Sandia research facility in Albuquerque not located on Kirtland AFB.

The entire $75.8 million Center — one of five funded nationwide by the Office of Science — is expected to help keep the U.S. in a leading position in the expanding field of nanotechnology. Countries around the world are vying to be first in a research area that may have considerable economic, scientific and military consequences.

Researchers from the University of New Mexico Cancer Research Institute, the University of New Mexico, New Mexico Tech, and researchers from around the world will participate in nanotechnology projects.

The CINT Core Facility houses low-vibration laboratories with sensitive microscopes for materials characterization, chemical/biological synthesis labs, and a clean room for device integration. The Scanning Probes Laboratory houses unique and state-of-the-art instruments that are crucial to the advancement of nanoscience. The work will focus on nanomaterials and nanofabrication.

The 36,500 square-foot CINT Gateway to Los Alamos Facility at LANL features roughly 11,000 square feet of laboratory space dedicated to chemical and biological synthesis and characterization, biomaterials fabrication and characterization, optical microcopy and spectroscopy, physical synthesis, thin film fabrication, spatially resolved scanned probe characterization, and advanced computation.

Both facilities will house lab scientists, post doctoral researchers, technical support staff, and visiting researchers.

A ceremony marking the opening of the LANL Gateway Facility will be held in Los Alamos Monday, Aug. 21.

LANL is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) of the U.S. Department of Energy and works in partnership with NNSA’s Sandia and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories to support NNSA in its mission.

LANL develops and applies science and technology to ensure the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear deterrent; reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction, proliferation, and terrorism; and solve national problems in defense, energy, environment, and infrastructure.

Top of Page

---

Sandia is a multiprogram laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed Martin company, for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration. Sandia has major R&D responsibilities in national security, energy and environmental technologies, and economic competitiveness.

Sandia news media contact: Neal Singer, nsinger@sandia.gov, (505) 845-7078