Latest news with #LosAlamosNationalLaboratory
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
As drought threat looms, Los Alamos National Lab works to reduce its wildfire risk
Burned trunks from previous fires remain in the scrub oak brush and stands of aspens in the Jemez mountainside just overlooking portion of Los Alamos National Laboratory property. LANL leadership told media during a May 28 tour that they were taking steps to prepare and mitigate the risk of wildfires. (Courtesy of Los Alamos National Laboratory) As New Mexico water and fire managers prepare for increased drought and wildfire danger this summer, Los Alamos National Laboratory officials say the lab has taken steps to mitigate those threats on its campus. LANL provided a media tour mid-week to highlight those steps, but did not allow outside photography or recording. 'We're very proud of our preparedness efforts for wildfire,' said Deputy Laboratory Director of Operations Mark Davis from the floor of the Emergency Operations Center, as videos of the 2022 Cerro Pelado fire played across six screens on the wall. 'We want to show our efforts to communicate how our mitigation efforts will protect the lab, workforce, community and environment.' The state has identified the towns of Los Alamos and White Rock as high risk areas for wildfire threats, including LANL, which spans 36 square miles of mesas and canyons. The lab and surrounding town have been evacuated twice in the past 30 years due to fires. That included evacuations for two weeks during the Cerro Grande Fire in 2000, which burned 43,000 acres total, including 45 lab buildings and 7,500 acres of LANL property. Los Alamos evacuated for another 10 days during the 2011 Las Conchas fire, which burned more than 156,000 acres, though only one acre on the lab's property. In 2022, during the same time the Hermit's Peak-Calf Canyon fires raged, the Cerro Pelado fire, also caused by a controlled burn, sparked up and ultimately burned 45,000 acres, requiring the lab to move to remote work in preparation for an evacuation. In 2022, at the request of the Biden Administration, LANL released its Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment and Resilience Plan, which showed that increased wildfire presented the highest risks to equipment, electricity systems, onsite radioactive waste processing, buildings, water systems and communications systems. Critics say climate threats to the laboratory are compounding. LANL's proposed thinning is 'a slow job, but certainly necessary,' said Greg Mello, the executive director of nuclear nonproliferation nonprofit Los Alamos Study Group. But he said the hazards with climate change are stacking up. 'We just wish that the laboratory wasn't straining against every single environmental constraint that there is on that plateau,' Mello said. 'The laboratory is too big and trying to do too much in a place that was never appropriate for a laboratory of the present scale, let alone the additional laboratory facilities and staff that they envision.' The approximately 18,000 people employed at LANL work mostly in science and engineering, from modeling infectious diseases to increasing the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile. 'Our missions are vital and critical to national security and they cannot fail,' Davis said. The Jemez wilderness bears scars from the Cerro Grande and Las Conchas fires. Large bald patches with skinny charred remains of the ponderosa pines stand among scrub oak brush replacing the once-forested area. Recent scattered rainstorms offered a small reprieve, but the area remains in Stage 1 fire restrictions — an elevated threat level that restricts all campfires or outdoor burning. Laboratory facilities are interspersed on the top of mesas to higher elevation ponderosa pine forests, separated by canyons and arroyos filled with brush. The lab is bordered by federally managed forests; San Ildefonso and Jemez Pueblos; and Santa Fe and Los Alamos County land. The patchwork of agencies has complicated firefighting and mitigation efforts in the past, said Jeff Dare, who leads the Emergency Operations Center, but Cerro Pelado offered a framework for more cooperation with members of county government and liaisons for surrounding federal agencies and tribal governments. The lab is part of the Master Cooperative Wildland Fire Response Agreement, which allocates additional resources such as helicopters and personnel to fight any wildfire that does appear, Dare said, adding: 'It protects the laboratory before it can get here.' The more recent focus has been trimming back the areas around lab buildings, roads and utility lines, said Richard Nieto, LANL's wildland fire program manager. Trimming has occurred on an estimated 12% to 15% of lab property. 'Hope is not a strategy,' Nieto said, adding that the area needs to better adapt to fires when they happen. 'This area was meant to burn; it's what we have to deal with, ecologically.' But overgrowth is a challenge. Much of the higher-elevation ponderosa forests sport 400 to 1,300 trees per acre, rather than the healthier 50 to 150 trees per acre, he said. Habitats for two endangered species and archeological sites also require consideration. Beyond trimming, the lab is working on developing plans for prescribed burns, but will take another three to five years to realize, he said. On the other side of lab property, fences looped with concertina wire and sporting signs warning of radiological hazards contain Area G. Vaguely merengue- shaped white tents — coated in fireproof material — stand amid the juniper and piñon scrub. Inside, under crisscrossed steel frames, stacked white containers on metal pallets contain legacy waste from the lab's work in the nuclear program. The facilities are geared to reducing fire concerns, said Gail Helm, the facility operations director for N3B, which is contracted to manage the 10-year $2 billion dollar cleanup of Cold War Era legacy waste. The tents include fire detection and suppression. Concrete barricades surround them to prevent vehicle accidents and potential fires. Under the Stage 1 fire restrictions, a water truck remains onsite at all times. To the west of Area G lies Technical Area 53, where the lab logs and stores new transuranic nuclear waste — such as gloves contaminated with plutonium — produced at the new plutonium pit production site. The waste is eventually disposed off-site at the Waste Isolation Pilot Project outside of Carlsbad. Thomas Vigil, the deputy group leader at the Chemical and Waste Facilities said LANL is doing 'its due diligence' to follow every protocol to keep the public and workers safe. 'This is my state, this is where we live,' he said. 'I live just down the road, and it's important to me.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Science
- Yahoo
Life on Mars? Paper co-authored by LANL scientist says more terraforming research needed
It might be surprising to hear planetary scientist Nina Lanza use the word 'disappointing' in the same sentence as 'Mars.' After all, the Los Alamos National Laboratory researcher has dedicated her entire career to the Red Planet. Lanza personally has been fascinated with Mars since seeing images taken of the surface during the 1997 Pathfinder mission. But she said the earlier Viking missions in the 1970s were a letdown to many, leading to a longtime lack of interest in Earth's rusty neighbor and an approximately two-decade gap before the next Mars mission. 'We saw a bunch of rocks,' Lanza said. 'That's not actually unexpected — that's what planets are made out of. But there was so much hype, I think, built up from 100 years of study of Mars as having canals, with these civilizations moving water. All of that was built up so much that when we actually saw the surface of Mars as it is, people couldn't help being disappointed.' That's changed. Lanza, who recently co-authored a perspective paper on the potential to terraform Mars, said the fourth planet from the sun is going through a renaissance. Technological advances, Space X and Andy Weir's The Martian have returned Mars to the forefront of the public's imagination. An idea popularized by astronomer and planetary scientist Carl Sagan in 1971 is having a renaissance as well: terraforming. 'Mars has been a lot more of a complex, dynamic place than we really gave it credit for when we first landed with Viking,' Lanza said. 'It's a place with a lot of resources. It's a place that I think we can, yet again, start to imagine ourselves going to and being there on the surface.' Nina Lanza X post Nina Lanza, a Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist who has dedicated her career to Mars, documents milestones in red planet research on her X account. Her perspective paper, published in Nature Astronomy, asks two main questions: Can the currently inhospitable Mars be warmed enough for life? And, once that question is answered, another arises: Should it? The paper makes a case for more terraforming research. But there's a long way to go before the red planet turns green. Terraforming has, in the past, been relegated to the pages of novels. A 2018 study published in Nature Astronomy suggested there's not enough readily accessible carbon dioxide left on Mars to warm the planet sufficiently with greenhouse gases alone. But Edwin Kite, associate professor of planetary science at the University of Chicago and another co-author on the perspective paper, said there's been technological advances in the past couple of years that have made terraforming seem more in reach. 'It hasn't been a goal in the past because it's been seen as science fiction,' Kite said. '… It's only in the last few years that there's been a big increase in our ability to move mass around the solar system, and these new warming efforts that make it seem like something we might actually do — as opposed to science fiction.' A friendlier climate New Mexico and Mars are both deserts, Lanza noted. Water scarcity is a big problem in the Southwest, but it pales in comparison to the lack of readily accessible water on Mars. The majority of the planet's water reserves are in its coldest parts, according to her paper. Mars was likely once a warmer, wetter place, but that's not the case now. Cold, dry and radiation heavy, its surface is 'worse than the worst deserts on Earth,' Lanza said — more akin to the frozen desert of Antarctica. New Mexico is 'like a tropical jungle compared to Mars,' she said. Mars also has a thin atmosphere. Nina Lanza 'Right now, Mars is not a great place to go if you're a human — or any kind of microscopic life. It's a really harsh environment,' Lanza said. '[But] you can make it less harsh, even if you can't recreate Earth.' Kite said there's several potential ways to address these challenges and warm Mars. For example, in a 2024 article co-authored by Kite, researchers looked at using artificial aerosols made of materials readily available on the planet's surface, rather than greenhouse gases, and found it potentially could warm the planet more effectively. The recent perspective paper also delves into using solar sails and other methods to potentially increase the planet's average global temperature by 'tens of degrees' over the course of several years. Raising ethical questions But 'can' and 'should' are two different words. The paper delves into the ethics of terraforming — and putting humans on Mars in general. 'Indeed, any movement of humans beyond Earth raises ethical issues,' the paper states. 'It is a trope of science fiction that, even though humans have already restructured Earth's land surface, nitrogen cycle and so on at the planetary scale, attempts to do the same for other worlds will be seen as dysfunctional.' Much of that swirls around a lingering question left unanswered by David Bowie: Is there, or has there ever been, life on Mars? If there is, researchers argue, that totally changes the discussion about terraforming. While the planet appears dead on the surface, Kite said, there could be life lurking in the deep subsurface. And Lanza said rocks studied with Mars rovers have displayed 'fascinating chemistry' that could be an indicator of ancient life on Mars. 'If we had seen it on Earth, it wouldn't be a question to us that this was formed by life,' Lanza said. 'But because it's on Mars, it requires much, much larger burden of proof.' In some ways, the perspective paper is a call to action: More research is needed. Such research could also inform our knowledge of Earth, Lanza said, noting the planet's changing climate. Mars has gone through its own climate change, becoming drier and colder; terraforming would be yet another change. The surface is also much more ancient than Earth's, Lanza said, allowing for a more complete geologic record. But, while similar, Mars and Earth have fundamental differences, Lanza said. Terraforming could make them more similar, but Mars will never become a copy of Earth. 'Earth is unique, Mars is unique, and Mars will continue to be unique,' Lanza said. 'Planets are never going to be identical.' Nina Lanza Stalled sample mission Evidence of life could be in samples of matter collected on the planet's surface, which NASA had planned to return to Earth for study. The Mars rover Perseverance has been collecting samples, but they might not make it to Earth. An early proposed budget report said costly missions like Mars Sample Return, described as 'grossly over budget,' should be terminated. The need for research on samples would be fulfilled by human missions to Mars, the report stated. It's not the first time the high cost of the mission has raised eyebrows. An independent September 2023 report expressed concerns over an 'unrealistic budget and schedule expectations.' The mission was unlikely to meet proposed timelines, the report said, and the proposed fiscal year 2024 budget wouldn't be enough to get the program off the ground. However, the value of the samples is high, the report stated. The return would 'revolutionize' the understanding of the inner solar system and answer 'one of the most important scientific questions we can answer' — whether there is, or was, life off of Earth. But NASA struggled to communicate the importance of the mission to the public, the report stated. Last year, then-NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said the agency was working on a plan to address the issues. 'Mars Sample Return will be one of the most complex missions NASA has ever undertaken. The bottom line is, an $11 billion budget is too expensive, and a 2040 return date is too far away,' Nelson said in an August news release. 'Safely landing and collecting the samples, launching a rocket with the samples off another planet — which has never been done before — and safely transporting the samples more than 33 million miles back to Earth is no small task. We need to look outside the box to find a way ahead that is both affordable and returns samples in a reasonable timeframe.' Nina Lanza Lanza said the Mars Sample Return mission is critical. She doesn't see human missions as an alternative — the human presence can disrupt the planet's landscape, potentially obscuring any record of ancient or current life. The samples can also help protect humans, and their equipment, on future Mars missions, she said. She pointed to lunar regolith, sharp dust on the moon that can be damaging to breathe. 'Understanding what Mars is made out of and how it might pose any particular hazards to health, that's really important if you're going to send people into that hazard,' Lanza said. Kite had a different perspective. Although the samples have been 'judiciously chosen,' he said, they won't answer every question about Mars — and the high cost makes it unlikely other sample return missions will be approved. 'Even if it had been pursued, it would have been the last sample return, because taxpayers would never sign off on a second one that was very expensive,' Kite said. '… Making it that expensive is a very eggs-in-one-basket approach, because it seems that your first bunch of samples will answer all questions about Mars.' He added, 'I don't think that's likely.'
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Couple Celebrating 70th Wedding Anniversary Reveal Secrets to a Lasting Marriage
Don and Lorrie Davidson celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary on May 21 The couple revealed their best advice for a long-lasting marriage to Los Alamos Daily Post They both agreed to "not to go to bed angry with each other" and to "talk out your disagreements"One couple celebrating their 70th wedding anniversary is revealing the key to a long-lasting marriage. Don and Lorrie Davidson of White Rock, New Mexico, marked 70 years of marriage on Wednesday, May 21. The pair told Carol A. Clark of Los Alamos Daily Post what their advice is for younger couples hoping to reach seven decades together too. 'We believed our wedding vows never tarnished, they are as bright and shiny as they were 70 years ago!" Don said. "My advice would be not to go to bed angry with each other, work out the differences that arise. Most differences are not important in the grand scheme of life." He continued, "Give over 50% of everything. The reason I fell in love with her is that I felt she was the missing piece to the jigsaw puzzle of my life; without her, I am incomplete." Lorrie agreed with her husband's words of wisdom. "If there are differences of opinion, don't let them fester," she said. "Talk out your disagreements and don't go to bed angry at each other." The duo met at the Illinois Insurance Bureau office and were close friends before they entered a romantic relationship with each other. Don and Lorrie dated for a few years before tying the knot in 1955 at the Trinity Episcopal Church in Wheaton, Illinois, when they were 26 and 23 years old, respectively. Before settling in White Rock in 1973, the pair moved 14 times within their marriage for Don's job in the military and insurance business. Once in New Mexico, Don became a fire protection and safety engineer at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Meanwhile, Lorrie ran The Shop on the Corner in the Episcopal church for 24 years. Over the years, the couple welcomed five children and gained 9 grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild. They have also been highly involved with Order of the Eastern Star, the Scottish Rite and Shriners, York Rite and are devout members of Trinity on the Hill Episcopal Church. is now available in the Apple App Store! Download it now for the most binge-worthy celeb content, exclusive video clips, astrology updates and more! Earlier this year, England-based couple Derek and Brenda Dodge, another couple who celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary, told the BBC in March that the key to a good marriage is "love, respect for one another, patience, being truthful and to understand you don't always have to agree." Back in January, centenarian couple Betty and Elton Denner reflected on the success behind their long-lasting marriage, just three months after celebrating their 82nd wedding anniversary. "Their advice for a loving relationship is simple: patience, don't win an argument, do things together, with each other and the Lord," the couple's daughter, Christie Regan, told PEOPLE. She continued, "They credit their faith in Jesus as the strength in their marriage, guiding them each and every day. The love of their Lord has blessed and sustained them." In February, the longest-living married couple at the time, Manoel Angelim Dino and Maria de Sousa Dino, said their answer to their 84-year union is simple: love. Read the original article on People
NDTV
21-05-2025
- Science
- NDTV
He Made World's First Hydrogen Bomb But Kept It A Secret For 50 Years
Richard L Garwin, the creator of America's hydrogen bomb, died on May 13 at his home in Scarsdale, New York. He was 97. Over the course of his seven-decade career, Mr Garwin laid the groundwork for insights into the structure of the universe. He also helped in the development of several medical and computer marvels. But his contribution to the one invention that changed the course of history remained a secret for almost 50 years. At the age of 23, he designed the world's first hydrogen bomb. Mr Garwin, who was then a professor at the University of Chicago and just a summer consultant at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, used physicist Edward Teller and mathematician Stanislaw Ulam's concepts to design the hydrogen bomb in 1951-1952. The experimental device, code-named Ivy Mike, was successfully tested on the Marshall Islands on November 1, 1952. Mr Garwin's contribution to the creation of the first hydrogen bomb was a well-kept secret for decades. Outside a select group of government, military, and intelligence officials, no one knew about his role in the experiment due to the secrecy surrounding the project. Edward Teller, whose name had long been associated with the bomb, first credited Mr Garwin in a 1981 taped statement, acknowledging his crucial role in the invention. "The shot was fired almost precisely according to Garwin's design," Mr Teller said, as per The NY Times. The recording was lost to history for 22 years. The late acknowledgement received little attention, and Mr Garwin remained unknown to the public for a long time. In an interview with Esquire magazine in 1984, Mr Garwin opened up about getting little to no recognition for his work on the hydrogen bomb. He said, "I never felt that building the hydrogen bomb was the most important thing in the world, or even in my life at the time." This changed in April 2001 when George A Keyworth II, Mr Teller's friend, provided the transcript of the tape recording to The New York Times. Even though Teller had earlier recognised the young physicist's contribution, such references were lost in specialised writings and meetings. Suddenly, fifty years after the event, Mr Garwin gained wide public recognition as the creator of the H-bomb. Meanwhile, after his success on the hydrogen bomb project, Mr Garwin accepted a job at the International Business Machines Corporation, where he worked for four decades, until his retirement. In between this, Mr Garwin remained a government consultant, offering advice on matters pertaining to national defence. The physicist was an adviser to several American Presidents, such as Dwight D Eisenhower, John F Kennedy, Lyndon B Johnson, Richard M Nixon, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Richard L Garwin's many honours include the 2002 National Medal of Science, the nation's highest award for accomplishments in science and engineering, given by US President George W Bush and the 2016 Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award, given by President Barack Obama.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Small business owners invited to meet with LANL scientists at Tuesday event
An event designed to connect local business owners with some of the brightest minds at Los Alamos National Laboratory will take place Tuesday in Santa Fe. The event, presented by the New Mexico Small Business Assistance Program, will provide participating business owners with the chance to interact with LANL scientists to work out any technical challenges or other issues they may be facing. According to a news release, the event will feature a 'matchmaking' segment during which business owners will meet one on one with scientists to discuss how to take advantage of their expertise. That will be followed by a casual networking session. Sanna Sevanto, a LANL scientist who has taken part in two of the events in the past, said she and her associates at the lab love participating in the gathering each year, partly because it represents a departure from much of the work they normally do. 'The scientists feel like it makes a difference with the companies,' she said. 'With many of their projects, they don't see immediate results. But in this case, they're directly solving challenges so [the companies] can go forward.' Savanto said LANL scientists are eager to tackle all sorts of challenges on behalf of business owners. A typical issue might be a company that does not have the means or equipment to test a new product to verify its viability. She said LANL scientists sometimes can perform that task for the business, helping prepare the product for the market. In other instances, the LANL staff can help solve a more direct problem. The small businesses that are eligible to participate in the event include farms, she said, so if an orchard owner is having issues with frostbitten crops, LANL scientists might be able to help them find an innovative, affordable way to keep their trees warm enough to avoid that fate. 'It is rewarding,' Savanto said. 'Our researchers and technicians love these projects because we are interacting with people directly.' The event is open to New Mexico small business owners who are experiencing a problem that is slowing or stopping their production. The event normally is limited to 15 businesses. That number already has been met this year, LANL spokesperson Avery Arena said, but officials have decided to keep registration open through the weekend to accommodate more businesses. The event takes place from 2 to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday on the LANL campus in Santa Fe. Those taking part in the event will receive additional information after registering at A spokesperson declined to provide the address as a security measure, but participating businesses will receive the location after they register.
