Science and Technology Highlights

Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and their collaborators developed a new process for magnet fabrication that skips two major, energy-intensive steps and doesn’t produce harmful byproducts.
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Energy-efficient process delivers rare-earth element for magnets

LLNL researchers and collaborators develop a new process for neodymium magnet fabrication. 

LLNL scientists Jeremy Feaster and Steven Hawks are collaborating on a process to convert wastewater into clean water and recovered fertilizer. Here they hold the electrochemical reactor for the final step of the process.
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Turning wastewater into valuable fertilizer

LLNL researchers are developing a process to convert wastewater into clean water and recycled fertilizer. 

The cryogenic-compatible X-ray, neutron and blast snout (CryoXNBS) safely houses material samples to be subjected to fusion ignition irradiation environments inside a solid double containment enclosure during a National Ignition Facility (NIF) experiment.
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LLNL conducts milestone nuclear survivability experiment at NIF

LLNL conducts NIF experiment to assess the ability of U.S. nuclear weapons to survive encounters with adversary missile defenses and reach their targets. 

The diamond-shaped stamp used at the Y-12 National Security Complex to certify the First Production Unit of the W80-4 canned subassembly, a key milestone in the Life Extension Program.
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LLNL’s designs enable delivery of W80-4 subassembly First Production Unit

NNSA announces the diamond stamping of the first production unit of a canned subassembly for the W80-4 Life Extension Program will be achieved 18 months ahead of schedule.

Scientist Thomas Kruijer uses the thermal ionization mass spectrometry (TIMS) facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to analyze meteorite samples.
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Meteorite samples are time capsules from the early solar system

LLNL scientist and collaborators describe how meteorites tell the story of the early solar system. 

Researchers shed light on how memory T cells, which are crucial for lifelong immunity, live and persist in different parts of the body.
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Not all immune cells are created equal

In a recent study, LLNL scientists and collaborators explain how long memory T cells live and persist in different parts of the body.

Artist’s illustration of gold compressed to ultra-high pressures by laser pulses at the National Ignition Facility. X-rays scatter from the sample, producing diffraction patterns that reveal how its atomic structure changes under extreme compression.
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Watching gold change structure at extreme pressures

In a recent paper, LLNL researchers and collaborators conducted high-pressure experiments with gold.  

The newly discovered phase of water, Ice XXI, only forms from water under strong supercompression. It is the largest and most complex unit of any ice phase discovered so far.
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Researchers discover entirely new phase of ice

In a recent study, LLNL researchers explored how water freezes under extreme compression at room temperature.

Harrison Horn and collaborators used a laser-heated diamond-anvil cell to recreate the conditions that could exist on some exoplanets.
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Experiments show how water could form on exoplanets, disrupting current theories

In a recent study, an LLNL postdoctoral researcher demonstrates a novel pathway for producing significant quantities of water on sub-Neptune-sized exoplanets.

Researchers used Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s exascale supercomputer El Capitan to perform the largest fluid dynamics simulation ever — surpassing one quadrillion degrees of freedom in a single computational fluid dynamics problem. The team focused the effort on rocket–rocket plume interactions, achieving better than 500 trillion grid points, or 500 quadrillion degrees of freedom, in simulating the turbulent exhaust flow generated by many rocket engines firing simultaneously.
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Gordon Bell finalist team pushes scale of rocket simulation on El Capitan

Researchers used LLNL's exascale supercomputer El Capitan to perform the largest fluid dynamics simulation ever.