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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 469 records · Page 26
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2020

Reducing the risks of wildfires

Anyone who has lived in New Mexico for at least a year realizes that the Land of Enchantment has six seasons. In addition to the four seasons everyone else has, we have a wildfire season, which typically comes during late spring and early summer. Wildfires sometimes even last through the monsoon season, when thunderstorms are lighter than usual. Wildfires, it seems, are inevitable in Los Alamos and the surrounding communities that make up part of northern New Mexico. In recent history, the 2000 Cerro Grande Fire destroyed 150,000 acres (including 7,500 acres of Laboratory property) and 235 Los Alamos homes. In 2011, the Las Conchas Fire burned more than 156,000 acres and threatened Los Alamos and the Lab. To minimize the chances of wildfires and to strengthen defenses against wildfires, the Laboratory every year carries out various fire-mitigation strategies throughout its 42 square miles.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2020

Integrated Initiative for Plutonium and Actinide Missions

Recognizing the dynamic environment and challenges facing the plutonium and actinide missions at Los Alamos National Laboratory over the next decade, Laboratory leadership established Fiscal Year (FY) 2020 Laboratory Agenda Item 2.6. This agenda item calls for the development and implementation of an integrated initiative for plutonium and actinide missions at Los Alamos. Over the next decade, Los Alamos has been asked to significantly ramp up pit production to help address nuclear stockpile and nuclear deterrence needs, heat source production to support expansion in space exploration, evaluation of stockpile returns, processing operations in support of nonproliferation, and the actinide science to support all of these efforts. All of this must be accomplished while significantly increasing the size of our plutonium and actinide missions workforce and modernizing and updating critical infrastructure. Only through enhanced integration of science, technology, and engineering (ST&E), manufacturing, and mission operations will we enable achievement of these critical missions. An overall summary of the plutonium and actinide missions is included in Figure 1 on Page 3 and Figure 2 on Page 4 summarizes our goals, objectives, FY 2021 recommended actions and internal strategic priorities that are key elements of our integrated initiative.

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEF↗
DOE OSTI2021

A Valentine’s tribute to Lab love: Watch clips from 1943 wedding of two staff

She was a secretary for Director J. Robert Oppenheimer. He was a physicist who helped create the world’s first atomic bombs. And for 65 years they were Mr. and Mrs. Bradner. Hugh Bradner was the first person that Marjorie Hall met upon arrival to join the Lab’s clandestine war-time efforts. He happened to be in Dorothy McKibbin’s Santa Fe office when Marjorie walked in. It was love at first sight, Marjorie recalled years later in an interview. The Bradners were married in September 1943 at McKibbin’s home. It was one of many weddings there during the Manhattan Project era. Los Alamos was fenced and guarded during this time, as staff raced to secretly develop nuclear weapons to help end World War II. Most were young – the average age was late 20s – and many, like the Bradners, met their lifelong partners then. The Bradners left Los Alamos after the war ended in 1945. Hugh is credited with inventing the neoprene wetsuit in 1951. The couple had one daughter. Marjorie, 89, and Hugh, 92, died just a few weeks apart in 2008 in California. Many of their home movies from their time in Los Alamos are preserved at the Lab. They are part of the collections in the National Security Research Center, which is the Lab’s classified library and also houses unclassified artifacts.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Direct Air Capture of CO2 (DAC) [Tech Snapshot]

Researchers at Los Alamos have extensive capabilities in design, testing and optimization of: (1) new capture materials based on membrane separation, amine and other solvent and sorbent separation, and porous materials; (2) biological capture methods, particularly algae and plants; (3) full-scale systems using science-based virtual learning; and (4) system performance under specific meteorological conditions, impacts of CO2 capture via atmospheric data and simulations, and availability of energy and storage capacity. The goal for Los Alamos is advancing our physical technologies and engineered systems approaches from the development phase to a minimal viable product in the energy sector for commercial purposes. Los Alamos is seeking strategic commercialization partners to work with us in advancing these capabilities and technologies for commercial viability.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

A Father’s Day Tribute Father-son Nobel Prize-winning physicists worked together at the Lab

Partners in physics during the World War II years, father and son Niels and Aage Bohr worked side by side on the Lab’s top-secret effort to create the first atomic bombs. Arriving in Los Alamos in late 1943, Aage was just 21 years old. He had been studying physics to follow in the footsteps of his father, who had won a Nobel Prize in 1922. Aage’s higher education, however, had been interrupted by the rapid spread of Nazism in Europe. The Bohrs, who had Jewish heritage, fled their native Denmark to escape persecution, eventually arriving in Los Alamos to aid in the creation of weapons that would help end the war. Their story is part of the collections at the National Security Research Center, which is the Lab’s classified library and also houses unclassified historic materials. While at Los Alamos, Niels and Aage were accorded VIP status because of the family’s scientific renown and given new names to protect their identities: Aage was James Baker, while his father was Nicholas Baker, but the scientific community called him Uncle Nick. Whether called Niels and Aage or Nick and Jim, father and son were inseparable.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2021

Fractured Earth Laboratory

Researchers at Los Alamos apply extensive knowledge and expertise through the Los Alamos Fractured Earth Laboratory to measure elusive rock fracture, chemical, cementing, and flow properties with purposebuilt systems that apply new and emerging measurement approaches. Unlike traditional rock mechanics laboratories, this unique laboratory capability allows researchers to accurately measure and observe fracture growth and transient flow in rock samples with microtomography at subsurface conditions. This provides critical information to solve complex and challenging subsurface fracture and flow process problems. Los Alamos is seeking to offer the Fractured Earth Laboratory’s measurement capabilities and expertise to researchers and developers in the oil and gas; geothermal; and the carbon capture, sequestration, and utilization industries. By utilizing the Fractured Earth Laboratory’s capabilities, researchers in these industries will have access to tools diagnose problems and develop solutions to subsurface issues.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Legacy of Metropolis continues through new materials donated to classified library collections

“From the very beginning of the Los Alamos project, it was inevitable that the Laboratory would suffer total immersion in computing,” said Nicholas Constantine Metropolis in 1976, reflecting his characteristic humor. Metropolis had succinctly summarized the prominent place of computing in Los Alamos’s mission and history. Metropolis himself played no small role in that “total immersion,” exemplified by the Lab’s supercomputing center, a postdoctoral fellowship, and the world-famous algorithm that carry his name. So does a collection of legacy materials in the National Security Research Center (NSRC). The NSRC, the Lab’s classified library, which also houses unclassified artifacts, recently received a new addition to the Metropolis Collections. This donation, 22 years after his death on October 17, 1999, provides tangible evidence of Metropolis’s continuing legacy at Los Alamos.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Fixed-Energy Response-Function Analysis with Multi-Efficiency (FRAM) Software, Version 6

Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed FixedEnergy Response- Function Analysis with Multiple Efficiency (FRAM), a powerful software tool for gamma-ray spectrometry isotopic analysis. This tool leverages Los Alamos expertise in nuclear safeguards, radiation detection systems, and related analysis techniques. A household name in the non-destructive assay community for over two decades, FRAM determines a special nuclear material source's isotopic composition by analyzing gamma-ray spectra. Los Alamos researchers have released the latest version of FRAM that incorporates several updates to the 2013 major release of FRAM, Version 5.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Project Y Badge Photo Collection [Slides]

The NSRC has several hundred badge photos of staff who worked at Los Alamos during the wartime Manhattan Project. The collection held by the NSRC represents an estimated 30% of the total badge photos taken at the secret wartime lab in Los Alamos, called Project Y. It is believed the majority of the badge photos of Project Y employees were destroyed or lost decades ago. The badge photos in the NSRC collections include famous staff, such as Oppenheimer, Groves, and many Nobel laureates who worked at Los Alamos. The existing photos have deteriorated significantly over the decades due to normal aging and previous poor handling procedures. Many photos had tears and non-archival tape applied.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI2023

2023 SAGE-Camp Report

The 7 th Summer Physics Camp for Young Women was successfully held in person in 2023 from June 5 th to 16 th at the New Mexico School for the Arts in Santa Fe, NM at Hilo Intermediate School in Hawaii. This year’s camp was dedicated to the topic of Energy Security and was made possible thanks to the strong collaboration of Los Alamos, Sandia and Hawaii teams and the logistical and financial support of Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories, New Mexico Consortium, SAGE- Moore Foundation, LANL Foundation, ACS, IEE, APS four corners, N3B, Hawaii Museum of Science and Technology, New Mexico School for the Arts (NMSA) and Tech Source. The camp mobilized more than 120 volunteers who made the camp a success. The camp is free of charge to the students and included free lunch and snacks for the busy brains to have plenty of energy, also included all materials needed for the hands-on activities (like drone building, crystal structure, solar panels, wind turbine fabrication, soldering, coding etc) and also a stipend for students who attended for the full two weeks and for two educators and two student mentors in NM. The camp offered 32 high school students from New Mexico and 8 from Hawaii a unique opportunity to explore science topics and meet a broad range of role model professionals across STEM fields including astrophysics, cybersecurity, Energy fields, space science, engineering, biophysics, environmental science, robotics, computer science, nuclear engineering, radiological science, physics and chemistry. With nearly 120 volunteers who came mainly from Los Alamos National Laboratory (66%) and Sandia national laboratories (18%), two funded educators from NM, Dr. Weldon Beauchamp and Dr. Ellee Cook, and two educators from Hilo, Dr. Pascale Creek Pinner and LeAnn Ragasa, the camp was educationally sound and extremely varied. The collaboration with school educators is critical for the goal of this camp to not only impact students' lives but also improve STEM education in NM and Hawaii. The ultimate goal of the camp is to increase higher education aspirations of students, empower them to consider careers in STEM and learn more about the opportunities available to them in our local colleges and DOE National Laboratories. In addition, the camp also hired 2 past students as student mentors, Megan Odom and Elisea Jackson, who currently attend NMSA and were students at the camp in 2022 when it was virtual. The in-person camp which aims at empowering under-represented minorities in STEM in our community received more than 52 applications this year from all over NM and 8 applications from Hawaii. Our selection criteria are based on diversity, equity and inclusion, and students for whom the camp can be a life-changing opportunity are given a chance to attend the camp. During COVID, the camp was held virtually and gave the opportunity to students from remote areas in NM and Hawaii to attend from their homes. This year, fantastic families supported students everyday even when home was in remote areas in NM like Lea county, Sandoval county, Bernalillo or Mora county. The organizers hope next year they can offer a residential option for students from remote areas.

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS↗
DOE OSTI2023

2022 Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Plan Summary

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL, or the Laboratory) produced a Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Plan (VARP) following Department of Energy (DOE) Guidance to assess and manage climate change related risks to the Laboratory’s assets and operations. This is a condensed summary of the Laboratory’s 2022 VARP – the full version of the document is not publicly available at this time. The VARP was led by the Pollution Prevention (P2) Program in the Environmental Protection and Compliance Division (EPC-DO) and covers the entirety of the 36-square-mile LANL site in Los Alamos, New Mexico. A Steering Committee, composed of representatives from the three main Laboratory Directorates and the Los Alamos Field Office, identified real property Critical Assets based on their Mission Dependency Index (MDI) scores. LANL used MDI scores of 70 and above, which are considered Mission-Critical, to generate a list of 141 Critical Asset facilities.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

El Estudio de Resiliencia de la Red Electrica de Puerto Rico y Transiciones a Energia 100% Renovable (PR100): Informe Final [Puerto Rico Grid Resilience and Transitions to 100% Renewable Energy Study (PR100): Final Report]

El Estudio de Resiliencia de la Red de Puerto Rico y Transiciones a Energia 100% Renovable (PR100) es un analisis integral basado en amplios aportes de las partes interesadas sobre posibles caminos para que Puerto Rico alcance su meta de 100% de energía renovable para 2050. PR100 fue un esfuerzo integrado que se baso en experiencia y capacidades de los laboratorios nacionales contribuyentes que exploraron posibles caminos para que Puerto Rico logre su objetivo de 100% de energía renovable en el largo plazo (para 2050), aumente la confiabilidad y la resiliencia en el plazo inmediato (dentro de los proximos anos), y trabajar hacia la justicia energetica. El proposito del estudio es brindar apoyo a las decisiones e informar las decisiones de inversion para los implementadores de la transicion energetica de Puerto Rico. See NREL/TP-6A20-88384 for the English translation of this report.

100% renewable energy target↗
DOE OSTI2024

SAIL-Isotopologue (SAIL-iso) Field Campaign Report

The SAIL-iso project took place from November 19, 2022 to June 3, 2023 as part of the U.S. Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) user facility’s Surface Atmosphere Integrated Field Laboratory (SAIL) project at the main project site in Gothic, Colorado. The project sought to use measurements of the stable isotopic composition of water vapor to better understand cloud-aerosol interactions in a remote mountainous watershed. Water vapor isotopologue and humidity measurements were determined using a Los Gatos Research Triple Water Vapor Isotope Analyzer (TWVIA). The instrument was deployed in the guest van and consists of three main components: a water vapor isotope analyzer, a Los Gatos Research Water Vapor Isotope Standard Source (WVISS), and a Los Gatos Research Dry Air Source. Ambient air samples were collected through an inlet located about one meter above roof of the shipping container. Samples were then delivered to the analyzer through Teflon tubing by use of an external pump to minimize the transport time between the inlet and analyzer. The inlet tubing was surrounded by a Briskheat heat trace and insulating material to ensure ambient air samples did not fall below the dew point and result in condensation. The analyzer uses cavity ringdown spectroscopy to report isotopic ratios of ambient air samples at a frequency of 1 Hz. The calibration unit of the instrument was used in conjunction with the dry air source to periodically measure the δ values of standard waters. It uses a nebulizer to push small water droplets into a hot chamber that vaporizes the water without fractionation. This vapor was then transported to the analyzer using a built-in compressor and the dry air source, which allows each standard with known δ values to be measured at a wide range of humidity values for post-measurement calibration of ambient air samples. Multiple sources of uncertainty are introduced at different stages during the data collection and processing. These include (1) instrument precision, (2) uncertainty in the secondary standards, (3) humidity-correction uncertainty, and (4) Vienna Standard Mean Ocean Water – Standard Light Antarctic Precipitation (VSMOW-SLAP) calibration uncertainty. Uncertainty from each step is propagated in quadrature to calculate a total uncertainty of each isotopologue. Uncertainty was determined to be 2.3‰ for δD and 0.4‰ for δ 18 O.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2023

High Multiplication Neutron Noise Measurements Using the 7uPCX Assembly

The Seven Percent Critical Experiment, or 7uPCX, is a system that mimics the physics of light water nuclear reactor systems by using uranium dioxide fuel pins at an enrichment of approximately 7%. 7uPCX is often used for benchmarking and nuclear data purposes. As part of a collaboration between Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and the Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire, measurements were performed in support of a high-multiplication, subcritical benchmark candidate for a thermal system. The measurements were completed by making subcritical configurations using the fuel loading pattern of a well-documented configuration of the Seven Percent Critical Experiment at Sandia National Laboratories, which exists as a benchmark in the International Criticality Safety Benchmark Evaluation Project handbook. These measurements, which aimed to capture multiplications ranging from approximately 10 to 1,000, also serve as an intercomparison between both the fielded detector systems and analysis methodologies with the goal of better characterizing the detectors and their ability to capture the state of the criticality these types of systems. Los Alamos National Laboratory’s measurements for this collaboration were made with five linked helium-3 based neutron multiplicity detectors placed on the periphery of the reactor tank beyond the infinite reflector thickness of water, and four organic scintillators placed in dry-wells in-reactor near the edge of the upper fuel grid plate. This work captures the Los Alamos National Laboratory measurements, the Rossi-α and Feynman-Y results, provides an intercomparison between the results of the 3 He neutron detectors and the organic scintillators, compares to simulation where possible, and expands on future work.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2026

Proposal for a dedicated search for millicharged and fractionally charged particles at LANL

In this paper, we propose an experiment, LANSCE-mQ, aiming to detect fractionally charged and millicharged particles (mCPs) using an 800 MeV proton beam fixed target at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center (LANSCE) facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory. This search can shed new light on numerous fundamental questions, including charge quantization, the predictions of string theories and grand unification theories, the gauge symmetry of the Standard Model, dark sector models, and the tests of cosmic reheating. We propose to install two-layer scintillation detectors made of plastic (such as EJ-200) or CeBr 3 to search for mCPs. Dedicated geant4 detector simulations and in situ measurements have been conducted to obtain a preliminary determination of the background rate. The dominant backgrounds are beam-induced neutrons and coincident dark current signals from the photomultiplier tubes, while beam-induced high-energy photons ( γ ’s) and cosmic muons are subdominant. We determined that LANSCE-mQ, the dedicated mCP experiment, has the leading mCP sensitivity for mass between ∼ 1 and 300 MeV.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Monitoring the Structural Health of the Stage-Four Gibbs Resistor In Order to Maintain a Functioning Pulse-Forming Network

The Dual-Axis Radiographic Hydrodynamic Test (DARHT) facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is a critical facility used for nuclear weapons research and development (Los Alamos National Laboratory). Its primary function is to provide high-resolution, real-time images of the behavior of materials under extreme conditions, specifically during the hydrodynamic testing of nuclear weapons surrogates. The facility uses advanced radiographic techniques, such as dual-axis X-ray imaging, to capture detailed snapshots of these materials as they react to high-pressure environments. DARHT plays a key role in maintaining the safety, security, and reliability of the U.S. nuclear arsenal, supporting the Stockpile Stewardship Program. The facility helps ensure that nuclear weapons perform as designed without the need for nuclear tests. Its dual-axis radiography provides more precise data than traditional single-axis imaging, offering a comprehensive view of the internal dynamics of a weapon's primary stage.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2025

Using molecular dynamics simulations to validate a new approach for determining the melting curves of materials

The Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), located in the state of New Mexico (United States), is one of the most iconic research centers in the world. Founded in 1943 as part of the Manhattan Project, it emerged from a global conflict and an unprecedented scientific emergency. At that time, the United States feared that Nazi Germany might develop an atomic weapon first. Under the direction of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, the U.S. government established a secret laboratory in an isolated region of the Los Alamos plateau, bringing together some of the greatest scientific minds of the era. This site, then known as Project Y, became the birthplace of the first atomic bomb.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2025

The MCNP ® 6 code: A decade of progress

After several years of effort involved in merging the Los Alamos National Laboratory MCNP5 and MCNPX codes, in 2013 the first production release of version 6 of the Monte Carlo N-Particle ® , or MCNP ® , code MCNP6.1 was distributed publicly. Since then, three significant releases have been issued: MCNP6.1.1beta in 2014, MCNP6.2 in 2018, and MCNP6.3 in 2023. While each release always contains new features, code enhancements, and bug fixes, each version has had a different primary focus, ranging from improved calculational efficiency to new powerful utilities and tools, to software modernization of the code base. With all that has been learned over the first decade of the MCNP6 code, continuous progress is being made toward a modernized, general-purpose Monte Carlo radiation transport code that remains a trusted resource for the global community of practitioners. This paper describes these first 10+ years of the MCNP6 code and its continually improving data libraries, and gives some insight into how the next decade is expected to unfold.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗