Los Alamos Press Highlights

LANL's economic ripple effect grows in state

"When you start doing these estimates you see it (LANL) is a huge entity and it impacts us in so many ways," economist Doleswar Bhandari said. "The total economic impact of LANL to the state is 23,641 in employment, $1.6 billion in labor income — $2.9 billion in economic output." (Full Story)


Sixty-seven NM students receive Los Alamos Employees' Scholarship Fund scholarships

Madjolene Khweis of Taos is this year’s recipient of the platinum scholarship.

Sixty-seven New Mexico students are receiving scholarships thanks to the generosity of Los Alamos National Laboratory employees who donated to the Los Alamos Employees' Scholarship Fund. (Full Story)


How methane will reach the atmosphere

Global View of the Arctic Ocean. NASA image

The two-part study that recently concluded paints the most complete picture of how rising temperatures today are influencing the methane reserves stored under the waters. The work was carried out by experts from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory. (Full Story)


NNSA begins verification experiments at Nevada National Security Site

The experiment was conducted by the NNSS management and operations contractor National Security Technologies in partnership with Los Alamos National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories. (Full Story)


Teen gets supercomputer challenge top prize

Cole Kendrick of Los Alamos Middle School.

Cole Kendrick would have had a long wait to track the rotation of an entire galaxy, so he used Python code to write a computer program that condensed 1 billion years into about 15 days. (Full Story)




Study helps explain behavior of latest high-temp superconductors

A Rice University-led team of physicists this week offered up one of the first theoretical explanations of how two dissimilar types of high-temperature superconductors behave in similar ways. Co-authors include Jian-Xin Zhu, staff scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory. (Full Story)

Also in R&D:

Methane trapped under Arctic Ocean could bubble to surface

A two-part study by scientists from the U.S Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and Los Alamos National Laboratory paints one of the most detailed pictures yet of how climate change could impact millions of tons of methane frozen in sediment beneath the Arctic Ocean. Methane is one of the most potent greenhouse gases. (Full Story



Hurricane damage to forests: Scientists study impacts on carbon cycle

Berkeley Lab scientist Jeffrey Chambers and researchers at other institutions, including the Los Alamos National Laboratory, the University of Maryland and Tulane University, are developing models that evaluate the impact of tree mortality on the carbon cycle. (Full Story)



Cheaper Hydrogen Fuel Cells on the Horizon

Los Alamos National Laboratory researchers Gang Wu, left, and Piotr Zelenay examine a new non-precious-metal catalyst. LANL photo.

Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory have found a way to avoid the use of expensive platinum in hydrogen fuel cells, the environmentally-friendly devices used to power automobiles. (Full Story)


Several baffling puzzles in protein molecular structure solved with new method

Image of a protein from Mycobacterium tuberculosis. RCSB photo.

An international collaboration has led to a new, high-performance method that rapidly determined the structure of protein molecules. One of the lead authors is Thomas C. Terwilliger of Los Alamos National Laboratory. (Full Story)


Beard selected to lead Business and Operations Directorate, Girrens named head of Engineering

Carl Beard is the new principal associate director for business and operations at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Beard succeeds Mike Mallory, who earlier this year announced his retirement.

Steve Girrens will become the Lab's new associate director for engineering. (Full Story)


Hecker to be featured in Domenici documentary

Former Los Alamos National Laboratory director Sig Hecker is interviewed by Albuquerque-based TV producer Chris Schueler about the career of former New Mexico Senator Pete Domenici.

Former Los Alamos National Laboratory director Sig Hecker will be featured in a documentary about Pete Domenici to air this fall.

A couple of weeks ago, an Albuquerque-based TV producer Chris Schueler interviewed Hecker and they discussed a number of topics.

“We talked about Domenici’s support for LANL, how he was great at gathering information, how he championed several LANL initiatives and really helped the country understand the lab’s importance to our nation,” Schueler said Wednesday, a day before he was heading overseas to shoot another documentary. (Full Story -- subscription required to view entire story and both photos)


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