ARCHIVE - EES Division Highlights/Accomplishments 2003

Archive

March 31, 2004

LANL Collaborates with NASA on "Life on Mars" Theory
Ken Wohletz of the Geophysics group in Earth and Environmental Sciences was one of six scientists from across the nation asked to review new findings from the Mars Rover for NASA. Data from the Rover confirms the presence of surface water on Mars near its equator sometime in the past. Wohletz and the team of reviewers analyzed the mineralogy, chemistry, and surface material character and textures of the samples and determined that they represent evaporative deposits from that of a shallow lake. NASA used WohletzÕs expertise to distinguish this data from what might be expected in volcanic or hydrothermal regions, which NASA now recognizes as remaining possibilities. A press release detailing more findings can be found at http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/8259138.htm .

High Level U.S. and Canadian Officials Tour Yucca Mountain
Dick Kovach of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Yucca Mountain hosted State Assembly Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick and 15 representatives of Douglas County, Nevada on March 22nd on a tour of the underground facilities. The tour included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout. Also briefed earlier that day were 11 officials of the NEI, Congressional Staff, and members of the Nuclear Waste Management Organization Assessment Team of Canada.

DTRA visits Yucca Mountain
Two groups of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) visited the Yucca Mountain site on March 24th to receive a briefing by Dick Kovach and Bruce Reinert of Earth and Environmental Sciences on Geology, results of testing activities, and repository layout. The two groups were from the Air Force and the Defense Intelligence Agency.

LANL Participates in Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Technology Concepts Demonstration Project
Wendee Brunish of Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES) with John St. Ledger and Mike Schick of Decision Applications Division attended the Planning Tools Working Group Meeting for the Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Technology Concepts Demonstration Project. Brunish briefed the group on the EES-developed Geologic Assessment Methodology for Underground Targets (GAMUT), which is being used to develop 3-D high-fidelity models for sites of interest. The working group meeting was held on March 10 and 11 at Northrop Grumman International Technologies in Alexandria, VA.

Nevada Test Site Undergoes a Test Readiness Exercise
On March 16, Wendee Brunish, David Coblentz, Ken Wohletz, Rick Warren and Chris Bradley traveled to the Nevada test Site to attend a test readiness exercise for the prospective "Alpha" test planned by Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The exercise was planned by Jim Ogle (DX-5 - Radiation Diagnostics) and included a day-long meeting with the Department of Energy DOE, LANL, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and Bechtel Nevada Test Directors from past nuclear tests, current Test Directors for the subcritical experiments and future protege Test Directors. The extreme complexity of a successful test was detailed during a 4-hour exchange of information and past intuition on testing. Because DOE/NNSA regulations have changed since testing ceased over a decade ago, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) presented the regulations 'pathway' that must be followed should we return to testing. The second half of the day was spent on tours of the Icecap experiment (the last nuclear test that was to be preformed by LANL but cancelled by the moratorium). Past and future test scientists and engineers went through the 100-foot test rack in great detail. The following day, March 17, Rick Warren of Earth and Environmental Sciences at LANL lead a geologic field trip though the NTS geology concentrating on the volcanic sequence. Future containment scientists, David Coblentz and Chris Bradley, learned much about the nature of the formations that will contain any future tests.

March 24, 2004

Yucca Mountain Hosts GeoSciences Educational Group
On Wednesday, March 17th, Dick Kovach of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Yucca Mountain Program gave a briefing to about 35 representatives of the Midwest GeoSciences Group. The information presented included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout. The Midwest GeoSciences Group is a self-supported organization formed for the sole purpose of geoscience education, conducting workshops, short courses, and field trips.

U.S. NRC tours Yucca Mountain
Bruce Reinert of EES-YMP hosted a tour of the underground facilities and gave a briefing to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Office of the Inspector General (OIG). Beth Serepca, Team Leader for OIG, NRC and Rebecca Underhill, Management Analyst, OIG, NRC were taken to an Alcove in the main tunnel about 160 meters underground and provided an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout at the Yucca Mountain.

UC Santa Barbara Professor Presents Seminar on Earthquake Ruptures
Professor Ralph Archuleta of University of California at Santa Barbara visited Earth and Environmental Sciences Division on Thursday, March 18, 2004 to present a seminar titled, "Dynamic Earthquake Ruptures: Effects of Heterogeneous Stress." Professor Archuleta is from the Institute of Tectonics at UC, Santa Barbara, is currently the deputy director of the Southern California Earthquake Center and was a past president of the Seismological Society of America.

Earth and Environmental Sciences Employees reach out to Northern New Mexico
As part of a Los Alamos National Laboratory outreach effort, employees in Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES) have been taking great strides to touch the community in a variety of ways. Since September 2003, many of EES-6's employees have been doing everything from adopting a Santa Fe family at Christmas to helping improve water quality at the Pajarito Plateau, from tutoring local elementary students to hosting field trips to the Valles Caldera. Julianna Fessenden-Rahn and Cristella Valdez recently spent some time with 5th grade students at Espanola Elementary to teach them about tree rings, isotopes, and drought. Similar Earth Science tutoring efforts have been made by EES-6 employees with organizations and schools across northern New Mexico such as Santa Clara Pueblo, the Los Alamos Girl Scout Troop, Carlos Gilbert School in Santa Fe, and have even reached across the nation to institutions such as Marble Valley School in Sacramento, California and the University of Maryland. Don Hickmott's service on the Citizen's Advisory Board to provide updates on ER work brings the efforts closer to home and EES-6 employees continue to dedicate their spare time to spreading the word about the work they love.

LANL Attends Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team Workshop
Ward Hawkins of the Geophysics group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos National Laboratory participated in the Defense Threat Reduction Agency's Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team (IGAT) workshop held in Alexandria, VA, March 8-12, 2004. The IGAT provides support to STRATCOM and others in the form of site-specific and regional-scale geological characterizations. Hawkins serves on the IGAT steering committee.

LANL Attends ELFEN Finite Element Software Training Workshop
Two representatives from Rockfield Software visited Los Alamos National Laboratory the week of March 8th to give a training workshop on the ELFEN finite element software. The workshop was attended by David Coblentz of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Decision Analysis collaborators Earl Knight and Santiago Parra, and Erik Strack from Sandia National Laboratory. Topics covered included details of the elicit analysis package, how to utilize discrete element contacts and joint generation, the use of mesh adaptivity during modeling runs, how to employ user-defined material property libraries, importing geometry information from CUBIT for use in ELFEN, and details of modeling jointed rock masses and explosive simulations.

March 15, 2004

Geology of the American Southwest Publication Written by Los Alamos Geologist
The American Southwest, as described in Geology of the American Southwest, A Journey Through Two Billion Years of Plate Tectonic History, according to Cambridge University Press, "is considered a geologist's dream, and attracts a large number of undergraduate field classes, and amateur geologists. This book provides the first concise and accessible account of the geology and landscape of the region, and will prove invaluable to students and amateurs alike." The new textbook written by W. Scott Baldridge will be available to the public and academia in April 2004.

Dr. Baldridge is a staff member in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos and is both a geologist and volcanologist; he has worked at Los Alamos for over 25 years and in the Southwest for over 30 years. At Los Alamos, he has participated in a variety of programs including Basic Energy Sciences, Yucca Mountain, and the Environmental Restoration project. For many years, he was the Focus Leader for the Lithospheric Processes focus of the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics. He has served as the Laboratory Co-director of the award-winning Summer of Applied Geophysical Experience (SAGE) student program for the last 17 years. Dr. Baldridge is an Adjunct Professor in the Earth and Planetary Sciences Department at the University of New Mexico (UNM), and regularly teaches at UNM as part of the UNM-LANL Program in Volcanology. He has also been an Associate Editor for the Geological Society of America Bulletin since 1998. Preparation of his book, for which he prepared on his own time, all of the photographs and most of the illustrations took over eight years and required thousands of miles of travel.

Los Alamos, AMEC Earth & Environmental Inc., and MSE Technology Applications, Awarded Best Poster at WM03
Becky Coel-Roback, Risk Reduction and Environmental Stewardship Division, and Marja Springer, Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos teamed with co-authors from AMEC Earth and Environmental and MSE Technology Applications to win the ANS Best Poster Presentation titled, "Non-Traditional In Situ Vitrification—A Technology Demonstration at Los Alamos National Laboratory." The poster was presented at the WM'03 Symposium and awarded during the Waste Management Symposium held in 2004. Waste Management 03 (and 04) is a conference attracting about 2000 people who look at Waste Management technologies and research in various areas pertaining to generating, storing and disposing of waste. It has been held yearly and every year they bestow a "best poster" award for the previous year's posters.

This paper presents the results of drilling and sampling following the hot test at Los Alamos' Material Disposal Area (MDA) V. The technology demonstration of non-traditional in situ vitrification involved the performance of two large-scale test melts. The second demonstration, referred to as the "hot" test, took place at Los Alamos' MDA V in April 2000. The hot test was conducted on a portion of an absorption bed that received radionuclide—and metal-contaminated wastewater from a laundry facility and a research laboratory from the mid-1940s to the early 1960s.

Local Science Fair Winner Inspired by Work with Los Alamos Geophysicist
Kevin Claytor a Junior at Los Alamos High School and a high school summer student working with Dr. Jim TenCate, a Geophysicist and Acoustician in the Geophysics Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division at Los Alamos, won first place in physics and "Best of Show" at the Northwest Regional Science Fair on March 6. His showing earned him a place to compete at the Intel International Science Fair to be held in Portland, Oregon in May. The winning project was, "Laser Acoustic Materials Analysis" and is essentially a new way to excite acoustic resonances in materials with a relatively low power laser that does not damage the material under test. Claytor has been to the International Science Fair twice before with his laser-based projects, but this project was inspired by Dr. TenCate's work at Los Alamos that is studying non-linear properties of rocks and other materials using a resonance technique. While working on his literature search, a surprising connection between his project and the LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory) telescope emerged. The telescope is so sensitive that the effect Kevin measured is an important noise source in the laser mirrors that was not previously thought to be important but was discovered by LIGO researchers only last year.

Yucca Mountain Tours Media, U of Notre Dame, Middle School, French and Japanese
Tours of the Yucca Mountain Project were conducted by Bruce Reinert, Brian Dozier, and Richard Kovach of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geotechnical Engineering and Research Group, on March 8 - 11. Representatives from Stephens Media Washington Bureau, the University of Notre Dame, Marvin Sedway Middle School, 16 French Legislators, and managers of Hokkaido Electric power Company, Japan received a general briefing of the tunnel and repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). This occurs underground in an excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, which include an overview of geology, results of testing activities, repository lay out, maps, and displays; the alcove is about 160 meters (200 yards) underground. March 10, 2004

WoldeGabriel's Work Led to New Fossil Find
Between 1997 and 2000 Dr. Yohannes Haile-Selassie of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History recovered 11 hominid specimens from at least five individuals who lived in a wood environment in Ethiopia between five and six million years ago. Dr. Giday WoldeGabriel of Los Alamos National Laboratory's Earth and Environmental Sciences Division led the accompanying fossil and geological work. The journal Nature initially published this work in 2001. The results of the newest discovery appear in the March 5 issue of the journal Science. The 2003 discovery of fossils are of an early hominid known as Ardipithecus kadabba. "The fossils date to between 5.54 and 5.77 million years ago. The primitive teeth show that Ar. kadabba was the earliest species of its genus, and may represent the first species on the human branch of the family tree just after the evolutionary split between lines leading to modern chimpanzees and humans." Additional information on WoldeGabriel is available at Capabilities—Bio

LANL Involvement in GEON Critical for Success
Professor A. Krishna Sinha, Professor of Geology, Department of Geosciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, presented a workshop on March 4 in Los Alamos on the GEON (GEOscience Network) research project. The GEON research project is funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in response to the growing need to interlink and share multidisciplinary data sets for understanding the complex dynamics of Earth systems. The need to manage vast amounts of Earth science data was recognized through NSF-sponsored meetings, which gave birth to the Geoinformatics initiative. The creation of GEON provides the critical initial infrastructure necessary to facilitate Geoinformatics and other research initiatives. Sinha has suggested that Los Alamos should take the lead, bring together the (appropriate) DOE laboratories, and submit a proposal to DOE to participate in the GEON project. Certainly a strong argument can be made that and DOE will benefit from it. Professor Sinha is the author of over 90 papers and reports, 160 abstracts, the Principal Investigator or Co-PI in externally funded research programs worth over six million dollars.

James Aldrich, Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES), was the host and contact for the workshop. Aldrich is EES's Point of Contact for the Center for Homeland Security/Chemical-Biological Threat Reduction.

Subcritical Experiment Series "Trumpet" Unanimously Approved
On February 26,2004 Thomas Kunkle, Chairman, David Coblentz, and Christopher Bradley, of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, attended a meeting of the Containment Review Panel (CRP) in order to review the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) containment plan for the subcritical experiment series, "Trumpet". The meeting was held at the Nevada Test Site (NTS). Gail Palowski, LLNL, presented the containment prospectus. The experiments are essentially a duplication (with minor modifications) of the Oboe series, which were completed in summer of 2003. The members of the CRP unanimously approved the containment plan for Trumpet. Subcritical experiments at the NTS are used to refine the equation of state for pit plutonium used in our nation's strategic nuclear weapons stockpile and to validate computational aspects of our stockpile stewardship program.

International Waste Management Conference Tours Yucca Mountain
Representatives attending the annual Waste Management Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada received a tour of the Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) on March 5. Bruce Reinert and Richard Kovach, of the Geotechnical Engineering and Research Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, conducted a tour for 21 representatives from Canada, Norway, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Sweden, and Australia. The briefing and tour of YMP included an overview of the geology, results of testing activities, and the repository layout. The tour includes the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). This occurs underground in an excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps/displays and is about 160 meters (200 yards) underground.

March 3, 2004

Earth and Environmental Sciences Briefs DTRA's Kane on Hard and Deeply Buried Target Work
Bill Kane from the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) visited Los Alamos on February 17, 2004. Bill Kane is in the Technology Development branch of DTRA and has specific responsibilities for developing programs to find, characterize, and assess hard and deeply buried targets.

Kane heard briefings on a number of topics including three from the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geophysics Group. Michael Fehler, Group Leader of the Geophysics group, presented Los Alamos' ideas for improved seismic imaging of underground facilities; Gregory Cole, Hydrology, Geochemistry, and Geology group, presented work on three-dimensional geologic models; and Wendee Brunish presented Allen Cogbill's (both of the Geophysics group) ideas for the development of a cold-atom interferometric gravity gradiometer.

GISLab's Fire and Flood Maps Featured in ESRI
The Environmental Sciences Research Institute (ESRI) featured Los Alamos' maps of "First Fire, Then Flood" on their web site the week of March 1. The maps were generated by the Los Alamos Geographic Information Sciences Laboratory (GISLab) in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division.

First Fire, Then Flood: The largest fire in New Mexico's history, labeled the Cerro Grande Fire, burned in northern New Mexico in the Jemez Mountains immediately west of Los Alamos and the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The fire burned approximately 43,000 acres of forest. From examining the fire's history and the terrain where it burned, it became apparent that a considerable post fire risk of flooding exists. This flooding risk is due to the increased hydrophobisity of the soils caused by the extreme intensity of the fire and the steep mountainous terrain that worsened the standard post fire hydrologic response.

The GIS lab at LANL produced base maps and exported data for modeling new post fire flood pools. The maps and modeling results provided the basis for determining key areas where infrastructure was at risk and the areas that needed to be addressed as soon as possible. The maps were also used to site Remote Automated Weather System (RAWS) stations and the locations of new and upgraded stream gauges. After the end of the first summer rainy season, modeling continued to further refine the post fire flood pools.

Los Alamos' GISLab's Maps in ESRI may be viewed at http://www.esri.com/mapmuseum/mapbook_gallery/volume18/environmental3.html

Los Alamos' GNEM R&E Program meets KB6.2 Delivery Deadlines
The Geophysics Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Ground Based Nuclear Explosion Monitoring Research and Engineering (GNEM R&E) program met their January deadline to deliver research results to Sandia National Laboratories in support of DOE NNSA's Knowledge Base (KB) release 6.2, scheduled to be delivered to the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC) at the end of March 2004.

The Los Alamos GNEM R&E program focuses on delivering products to contribute to the research and development efforts by the national authority to detect, locate, identify, and characterize nuclear explosions in all environments. The DOE NNSA KB efforts are focused on improving national nuclear explosion monitoring capabilities such as remotely monitoring tests by a proliferator, even in the absence of a treaty. The general coordination of tasks associated with this deliverable between LANL, SNL, LLNL, and AFTAC was lead by Julio Aguilar-Chang.

SNL Presents Developing Constitutive Models for Brittle-Porous Materials to EES
Members of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's (EES) Geophysics group recently participated in discussions with Arlo Fossum and Rebecca Brannon of Sandia National Laboratories (SNL). Los Alamos participants who attended the meeting were David Coblentz, Ted Carney, Chris Bradley, Wendee Brunish, and Bob Swift. Fossum and Brannon gave a presentation on their work on developing constitutive models for brittle-porous materials for use in large-scale structural applications in geomaterials and in ceramics. The talk was followed by a discussion of how to implement their model into Los Alamos' modeling software.

Simulating deformation and failure of natural geological materials (such as limestone, granite, and frozen soil), as well as rock-like engineered materials (such as concrete and ceramics), is at the core of a broad range of applications; this includes exploration and production activities for the petroleum industry, structural integrity assessment for civil engineering problems, and penetration resistance and debris field predictions for the defense community. For these materials, the common feature is the presence of micro-scale flaws such as porosity (which permits inelasticity even in purely hydrostatic loading) and networks of micro cracks (leading to low strength in the absence of confining pressure and to noticeable nonlinear elasticity, rate-sensitivity, and differences in material behavior under triaxial extension compared to triaxial compression). In addition, Brannon presented a synopsis of her work on TensorViz (tensor visualization software) and WISDM (a materials model database).

Technological University of Delft, Netherlands Collaborates on Ultrasonic Irradiation Work
Pietro Poesio from the Technological University of Delft, Netherlands visited the Geophysics Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES) and presented a seminar on the removal of colloidal particles from porous material by ultrasonic irradiation. Pietro also discussed possibilities for collaboration with Los Alamos investigators who are currently involved in similar research. His work forms the bulk of his Ph.D. dissertation and follows up on results of Los Alamos experiments performed in the early 1990's.

Colloidal particles can reduce the permeability and flow rate of fluids through porous media, such as rocks. This causes dramatic effects in many applications, such as oil and gas production and remediation of contaminated groundwater aquifers. Permeability reduction can be induced either by particle deposition onto the pore walls or by "particle bridge formation." Particle bridge formation is defined as the blockage of pore entrances due to the simultaneous arrival of many particles at a pore throat entrance. Pietro presented laboratory experiments on the removal of particles from a natural porous material (Berea sandstone). Experiments demonstrated that ultrasonic energy is effective at reducing permeability damage caused by both fouling mechanisms. He also presented theoretical models for both mechanisms to predict the extent of particle removal under a variety of physical conditions and for different acoustic wave parameters. Both models compare well with experimental data in term of trends, but the numerical agreement can still be improved.

Participants attending Pietro's talk were from EES, Engineering Sciences and Applications, and Computing Divisions. In addition to having discussions with staff at EES's Dynamic Stress Stimulation Laboratory, he also visited the colloid science experimental facilities in Chemistry Division.

EPA, Sweden, China, and Senate Staffers Tour Yucca Mountain
Six representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency (Region 5) toured the Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) on February 23. On February 24, 25, and 26, groups representing the following received tours of YMP: Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company, who are performing studies for a deep repository; the Korean Hydro-Nuclear Power Company; staffers from the US Senate Energy and Water Development Committee; China Atomic Energy Authority; China PUNT; China National Nuclear Corp.; Nuclear Power Institute of China; China Institute of Atomic Energy; Qinshan Nuclear Power Co.; Suzhou Nuclear Power Research Institute of Guangdong Nuclear Power Group; Shanghai Nuclear Engineering Research & Design Institute; Beijing Institute of Nuclear Engineering; China Institute for Radiation Protection; Institute of Nuclear Energy Technology at Tsinghua University; and China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Company.

Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geotechnical Engineering and Research group conducted all of the tours, which consisted of a general briefing of the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). This occurs underground in an excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps and displays and is about 160 meters (200 yards) underground. All briefings included an overview of the project's geology, results of testing activities, and the repository layout.

February 25, 2004

Yucca Mountain Survey Scouting for Buried Volcanoes
Scientists in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division coordinated the efforts of a contract company the week of February 17 to begin a helicopter-borne aeromagnetic survey in the region surrounding the site of the proposed Yucca Mountain Repository. The purpose of the survey, expected to take six to eight weeks, is to detect the magnetic signal of buried volcanoes in alluvial basins surrounding Yucca Mountain. Identification of buried volcanoes through the survey and drilling will be used to update estimates of the probability of a future volcano disrupting the proposed Yucca Mountain repository. The survey will greatly improve the resolution of earlier surveys by flying at low altitude with very close survey-line spacing (60 meters). The total length of the survey flight miles is 15,000 kilometers.

Yucca Mountain Conducts Tours for Energy and Senate Staffers
Two groups received tours on February 17 of the Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) that included the geology, results of testing activities, and the repository's layout. Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geotechnical Engineering and Research group briefed four representatives from Progress Energy; a company that is a diversified energy company with two electric utilities serving customers in North and South Carolina and Florida. The company also has operations covering merchant generation, energy marketing, natural gas exploration, fuel extraction, and rail services. Included in the tour were 31 representatives from the Corrective Action Program Owner's Group (CAP); CAP is a management tool for nuclear and operating facilities to track technical issues and employee concerns, identify the resources needed, and schedule appropriate action to correct the issues. CAP has responsibility for tracking issues, responsibility for action, and completion dates. This can include safety and health, operations, procedures, and environmental issues. On February 19 Reinert briefed staffers, Tammy Perrin and Andrew Willison, members of the Senate Energy and Water Development Committee.

February 18, 2004

Bechtel/SAIC (BSC) Management Recognizes Los Alamos' Mike Taylor as True Safety and Health Professional
On February 9, during a Bechtel/SAIC (BSC) Management Information Series Meeting, John T. Mitchell, President and General Manager of BSC, presented Michael F. Taylor, an Environment, Safety, and Health Specialist, in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Yucca Mountain Project and Test Coordination Office a recognition plaque, which read as follows:

"In recognition for outstanding efforts to assure the safety and health of the Yucca Mountain Project Personnel through championing a comprehensive Industrial Hygiene Monitoring Program. Your steadfast determination to protect your fellow workers and unceasing efforts to identify potential hazards epitomize the true safety and health professional".

Taylor was presented with the plaque for his involvement in implementing a Silica Protection Program for underground workers and scientists who participated in Tunnel Boring Machine Operations and the set-up of experimental studies in the Exploratory Studies Facility at Yucca Mountain from the early 90's to the present.

Los Alamos Scientist Co-Author on Bridging Non-Living and Living Matter
"Transitions between nonliving and living matter" was recently published in the journal Science, Vol. 303,13 Feb. (2004) p963-965; it was co-authored by a team of United States and international scientists: Steen Rasmussen, Los Alamos National Laboratory; Liaohai Chen, Argonne National Laboratory; David Deamer, University of California, Santa Cruz; David C. Krakauer, Santa Fe Institute; Norman H. Packard, Prediction Co.; Peter F. Stadler, University of Leipzig; and Mark A. Bedau, Reed College.

In a press release by Sue Vorenberg of the Albuquerque Tribune, "Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory are close to creating an organism completely different from any life on Earth. They have all the building blocks ready and are hoping in the next few years to create a new organism 10 million times smaller than the smallest bacteria, they say in an article released today in the journal Science." According to Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Steen Rasmussen, "If we can build creatures like this from scratch, we can design them to do things we've never seen in nature; they could be the building blocks for self-repairing systems, but we could also design them with metabolisms not found in nature. We could make them eat the worst contaminants out there, then die when they run out of food."

Documentation from the two international workshops: (1) "Bridging nonliving and living matter" at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Santa Fe Institute, September 9-11, 2003, and (2) "Protocells" at the seventh European Conference of Artificial Life (ECAL), Dortmund, Germany, September 13, 2003, can be found at http://www.ees.lanl.gov/protocells/index.shtml

Albuquerque Tribune release may be read at http://www.abqtrib.com/archives/news04/021304_news_life.shtml

Yucca Mountain Tours Framatome Fuel Users Group and Japanese Power Companies
On February 9, Bruce Reinert of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) briefed a group of 51 from France's Framatome Users Group. Framatome is a French company that specializes in plants, services, fuel, and equipment; they operate in France, Germany, and the US. In 2001, Framatome merged with Siemens to form Framatome ANP, and they acquired the former Duke Engineering & Services, a subsidiary of Duke Energy Corporation (United States) to help their customers power the world with safe, clean and costÐeffective energy.

On February 10 and 11, Bruce Reinert and Richard Kovach briefed several residents of Sun City, Nevada, representatives of the Japanese Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan, The Electric Daily News, and their Japanese Interpreter. The tours included an overview of the geology, results of testing activities, and the YMP repository layout. "Tours" at YMP consist of a general briefing of the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). This occurs underground in an excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps/displays and is about 160 meters (200 yards) underground.

February 11, 2004

Los Alamos Organizes Nuclear Testing Limitations Workshop
Ward Hawkins and Kenneth Wohletz of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division organized and attended the DOE/NA-241 Nuclear Testing Limitations Workshop held January 28-29 at the Cooperative Monitoring Center at Sandia National Laboratory. Participants from DOE, SNL, LLNL, PNNL, and Bechtel/Nevada contributed to the workshop.

The focus of the workshop was a review and editing of technology evaluations for "A Staged Approach for Cooperative Test Site Monitoring," a document Wohletz and Hawkins are preparing for DOE. This document is a study of monitoring technology issues that impact potential future policy for multilateral agreements concerning nuclear test sites. Discussion of existing treaties, current U.S. policy, nuclear test site activities, and Nevada Test Site readiness during this workshop helped in setting the scope for the work that was accomplished.

Demolition Concerns Quelled by Los Alamos Seismologist and Structural Engineers
Demolition work near the Laboratory's Administration Building recently resulted in shifting doorframes and cracks in walls on the western wing of the Building in early December. Many of the personnel located in this area are seismologists and began questioning the link between the nearby demolition and the infrastructure changes; facility personnel became involved and asked to have ground motion recorders installed at two levels of the building to measure the actual ground motions produced by the demolition activities. Seismologist Leigh House of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geophysics Group, installed what are called "strong ground motion" recorders, which recorded dozens of episodes when ground motions reached peak levels as large as a few percent of Earth's gravity ("g"). These data record the ground and building motions associated with the demolition activities in case there are any additional effects on the building.

French and Media Tour Yucca Mountain
On February 4, Richard Kovach of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Yucca Mountain Project (YMP) conducted a media tour for representatives from Agence France-Presse, the French Nuclear Safety Authority, and reporters, writers, and editors of The Humboldt Sun (Humboldt County, Nevada) and Battle Mountain Bugle. The tour included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and the YMP repository layout. The tour participants also received a general briefing of the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). This occurs underground in an excavation off the main tunnel called an "Alcove." This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps/displays and is about 160 meters (200 yards) underground.

February 4, 2004

Los Alamos Publishes Collaboration on Lamb Wave Research with Russia
Through the auspices of an official NATO Collaborative Research Grant, Dr. Oleg M. Raspopov, Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism, Ionosphere and Radio Wave Propagation, St. Petersburg Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Russia, Dr. Sergey N. Kulichkov, Obouhkov Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia, and Dr. Douglas O. ReVelle, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Los Alamos National Laboratory, began work in 1999 that lasted more than three years, on several new infrasound research topics including the generation and propagation of Lamb waves from small explosions and the very important influence of the atmospheric planetary boundary layer on Lamb waves.

More on ReVelle's research

This work has culminated in a major research publication in the very prestigious Russian Journal, Izvsetiya Atmospheric and Oceanic Physics (Vol. 40, pp. 1-9, 2004). During this period, our Russian collaborators visited Los Alamos for a week of hard work and planning and also interacted at several specialized research conferences around the world (American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, Passau, Germany, De Bilt, The Netherlands, The Hague, The Netherlands, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, etc.) where many early versions of this work were originally presented.

Yucca Mountain Tours For Japan, OSHA, and United Kingdom Ministry
Bruce Reinert, Richard Kovach, and Brian Dozier of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division's Geotechnical Engineering and Research group briefed interested parties on January 26 with an overview of geology, the results of testing activities and the repository layout of the Yucca Mountain Project (YMP). Representatives from the following eight organizations toured the project: Japanese Power Company Officials from the Institute of Applied Energy, Japan Electric Power Information Center, Inc., North American Operation, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Chubu Electric Power Company, Inc.

On January 28 a group from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Training Institute were briefed on the geology and testing facility with a special focus on underground safety systems, structures and components. In addition to the briefing, the OSHA group traveled about 2,800 meters underground and observed a test where electric heaters in simulated canisters are heating up the underground rock to provide scientists information on how this heating affects the geology of the repository. Members of the OSHA Training Institute representing Minnesota, Nevada, Rhode Island, Oklahoma, New Jersey, and Michigan were in attendance.

Four representatives from the United Kingdom Ministry of Defense toured the repository on January 29 and also traveled to the 2,800 underground electrical-heat test.

January 21, 2004

Earth and Environmental Sciences Contributes to Homeland Security
A team in the Hydrology/Geochemistry, and Geology Group in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES) contributed strongly to a proposal to DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration) that focuses on decontamination techniques for military facilities after a "dirty bomb" (radiological dispersal device) attack. This involves detailed geochemical modeling of the interactions between geomaterials such as concrete, granite, and other building stone, radiochemical contaminants delivered from the dirty bomb, and relative effectiveness of different decontamination strategies and agents.

In mid December 2003, we were notified by DARPA that the proposal is being awarded to Los Alamos and its partners for $3.1M. Naomi Becker is coordinating the participation and Patrick Longmire and Bill Carey are major participants as well. This will be a good foundation for further work in the homeland security area related to Radiological Dispersal Devices.

In addition, the group is heavily involved in the Laboratory's homeland security initiatives. Naomi Becker is the point of contact for nuclear and radiological work; Jim Aldrich is the point of contact for chemical/biological weapon-related issues; and Steen Rasmussen and Naomi Becker are participating in a Critical Infrastructure Protection/Decision Support Structure project for the Department of Homeland Security. This project develops operational models on 14 of the Nation's major infrastructures, and then uses these coupled models to evaluate how a terrorist incident affects a single infrastructure, and the resulting impact on other infrastructures.

Los Alamos Participates in Tunnel Target Defeat and Advanced Concept Technology Meeting
Members of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, Robert Swift, David Coblentz, and Gregory Cole, along with Earl Knight and Dave Steedman of Decision Analysis Division participated in the Tunnel Target Defeat/Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration meeting on January 21-22, 2004 at the United States Strategic Command in Omaha, NE.

The Test Working Group discussed updates on Discrete Gemini (Intermediate Scale Test) and Divine Strake (Full-scale Test). In the Site Characterization Working Group Session, Cole discussed relevant issues related to Los Alamos' work on GAMUT (Geologic Assessment Methodology for Underground Targets) applications.

Working groups and discussions were held in the following areas: Computational Working Group on the results of the Verification Problem 4; the final guidance for remaining verification problems; and the results of material property tests to support calculators (the three weapons laboratories and three Defense Threat Reduction Agency contractors) including a brief presentation of proposed approaches for modeling Discrete Gemini I and modeling requirements for Discrete Gemini 2.

Writing it Right: EES Communications Win STC Awards
Great science deserves to be communicated well. This year, the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES) was recognized with three awards for superior communications products by the Southwest Regional Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication (STC). The EES Progress Report 2001-2002 has earned an Award of Distinguished Technical Communication in the Technical Art Competition and an Award of Excellence in the Technical Publications Competition. The EES Division's Web site has earned an award of Merit in the Online Communications Competition.

Each year, this competition brings together the best in technical and scientific publications. This year's competition included 129 entries from California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Oklahoma. Congratulations for the winning the awards for EES communications went to: Ryan DeMares, Donald Montoya, Richard Leishman, Ann Rafferty, and Valerie Stockett (all from Information Management Division); Dottie Austin (EES); and all EES staff whose projects are featured in the EES Progress Report—2001 — 2002 as well as contributors to the EES Web site.

Los Alamos Hosts Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London
The Geodynamics team in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (Chris Bradley, Wendee Brunish, Ted Carney, David Coblentz, and Bob Swift) and personnel in the Decision Analysis Division (Earl Knight and Dave Steedman) recently sponsored and hosted a two-week visit by Dr. Ante Munjiza of Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London. The purpose of the visit was to discuss the feasibility of implementing his combined Continuum/Discrete-Element methods in CASH, a hydrocode under active development by Los Alamosê Applied Physics Division. Los Alamosê current need for this technology is to support ongoing programs tasked with improving capabilities for modeling the response and failure of underground structures subject to explosive loads.

Dr. Munjiza'a approach is unique in that material is modeled as a continuum until failure and disaggregation processes necessitate a discontinuous description of the material behavior. This approach captures the loading, failure, joint response, and collapse inherent in our problem of interest. Other applications include rock blasting, modeling fragmentation processes, and predictions of the seismic and air-blast response of aboveground structures.

At the conclusion of the visit the participants agreed to pursue a two-year collaborative effort to implement, test, and apply these methods. Efforts to place a contract are in progress.

January 14, 2004

Los Alamos Receives Funding for Threat Agent Work
The Earth and Environmental Sciences Division and Chemistry Division have received joint Institutional Program Development funding for program development in the area of isotopic and trace element forensics of threat agents.

Jeff Heikoop and Julianna Fessenden-Rahn in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division are leading the development of isotopic techniques that can be utilized to identify the production processes and production locations of threat pathogens used in terror attacks.

The techniques that they propose can also be used for forensics and attribution of chemical agents, high explosives, and narcotics, as well as for product authenticity and attribution studies of more mundane materials.

Potential future sponsors include the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, and the Drug Enforcement Agency.

Mike Ebinger New EES-2 Deputy Group Leader
EES-2 Group Leader Jim Bossert and I are pleased to announce the selection of Dr. Michael Ebinger as the new Deputy Group Leader in EES-2 (Atmospheric, Climate and Environmental Dynamics). Mike has been at Los Alamos as a Technical Staff Member since 1988, and has most recently served as Team Leader for the EES-2 Ecology Team and Director of Education and Outreach for the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program. Mike has also served as acting Deputy Group Leader in both EES-2 and EES-10 and has had a strong presence in LANL service as a mediator with the Ombuds Office and Fact Finder for Staff Relations. In recent program development, Mike has played a key role in infrastructure modeling for the Department of Homeland Security, and is one of the primary developers of the Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) technique.

Mike received his BS in Anthropology in 1980 from the University of Arizona, and a PhD in Soil Chemistry and Mineralogy from Purdue University in 1988. Mike's primary research expertise is in investigating soil processes and cycling of nutrients and contaminants in soils for terrestrial carbon sequestration and long-term ecological risk assessment.

Mike's outstanding experience in research and management will be a very valuable resource for the leadership of EES-2. Please join me in welcoming Mike to his new job.

Terry C. Wallace, Jr.

Division Leader
Earth and Environmental Sciences Division
EES DO, MS D446
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Los Alamos, NM 87545

Strategic Research names Dr. Terry C. Wallace, Jr. as EES Division Leader
I am proud to announce that Dr. Terry C. Wallace, Jr. has been selected to be Earth and Environmental Sciences Division Leader. Terry came to the Laboratory in May of this year as the EES Deputy Division Leader and has served as the Acting EES Division Leader since June as the result of Paul Weber moving to the Deputy Associate Director position in the Threat Reduction Directorate.

Since joining the Laboratory, Terry has served as both Deputy Division Leader and Division Leader in exemplary fashion. Terry has stellar credentials and a nation-wide search confirmed that Terry is the best choice to lead EES Division. I want to extend my appreciation and personal thanks to everyone who contributed to the selection process, especially the applicants and the search committee.

Before returning to Los Alamos in May, Terry was a Professor of Geosciences at the University of Arizona for 20 years. In addition, Terry served as a faculty member in the Applied Mathematics Graduate Program, was Curator of the University of Arizona Mineral Museum, and was Director of the Southern Arizona Seismic Observatory. He has authored or co-authored more than 80 peer reviewed publications in many areas of solid earth geophysics, including ground-based nuclear explosion monitoring, plate tectonics, regional Earth structure, and forensic seismology. Terry is the co-author of Modern Global Seismology (Lay and Wallace), one of the most widely used textbooks on the topic.

In many ways, Terry is coming home, as he grew up here and graduated from Los Alamos High School. He went on to receive two B.S. degrees (Mathematics and Geophysics) from New Mexico Tech in 1978. He earned his Ph.D in seismology from California Institute of Technology in 1983. In 1992, the American Geophysical Union honored Terry with the Macelwane Medal in recognition of outstanding research contributions by a young scientist. New Mexico Tech presented Terry with the Distinguished Alumni Award in 1995, and in February 2003, Carnegie Museum of Natural History honored him with the 2002 Mineralogical Medal for outstanding contributions in mineralogical preservation, conservation, and education. Terry is active in a number of professional organizations, including being elected as Vice President (1995) and President (1999-2000) of the Seismological Society of America. He was a founding member and was elected Chairman (1994-1996) of the Incorporated Research Institutions in Seismology (IRIS), a National Science Foundation funded consortium of more than 100 organizations.

Currently, Terry is chairman of the Committee on Seismology and Geodynamics at the National Research Council and is an ex-officio member of the Board on Earth Sciences and Resources. His is a member of the Seismic Review Panel (SRP) for the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC). The SRP is responsible for providing technical guidance and review of the Air Force's nuclear explosion monitoring mission.

Terry's appointment is effective Monday, December 22, 2003. Please join me in congratulating Terry on his new position.

Tom Meyer
Associate Director of Strategic Research

University of New Mexico Selects Dr. Paul Rich as Advisory Committee Member
Dr. Paul Rich of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division recently accepted an invitation to serve as a member of the newly formed University of New Mexico (UNM) Geographic Information Science (GIScience) Advisory Committee.

The invitation for membership was extended by Dr. Stan Morain, Chair of the Geography Department at UNM who stated that he worked closely with the New Mexico Geographic Information Council (NMGIC) to obtain names of prospective members. He stated that Dr. Rich was selected because of his obvious experience in one or more of the core technologies, his expressed needs for qualified geographers in the work force, and the applications and employment sectors that he represents.

The role of this committee is to assess the present curriculum and facilities, define a core set of courses required by students majoring in Geography, provide guidance on curriculum modernization, and to suggest options for implementing the spatial analysis component of the Department's program.

The formation of the committee was recommended by NMGIC to better prepare students for careers in spatial analysis; they also recommended that UNM advisory committee be comprised of university, government, and industry representatives. One of the Geography Department's responsibilities is to produce future geographers for careers requiring more extensive knowledge and experience in spatial data collection, analysis, integration, interpretation, and application.

Dr. Rich is the GIS Team Leader and a Technical Staff Member, at Los Alamos National Laboratory; Adjunct Professor, Dept. of Geography, University of New Mexico, 2003-present; Adjunct Professor, Dept. of Geography, UC Santa Barbara, 2002-present; Associate Professor (1996-2001, tenured), Assistant Professor (1991-1996), University of Kansas (KU), Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, Environmental Studies Program, and Kansas Biological Survey, and adjunct appointment Department of Geography.

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