ARCHIVE - EES Division Highlights/Accomplishments

Archive

September 21, 2005

EES Acquires Novel In Situ Soot Spectrometer For Air-Borne Atmospheric Sampling Of Black Carbon
Manvendra Dubey's aerosol team have acquired the first state-of-the-art, laser-based photoacoustic instrument that measures black carbon (soot) from combustion and biomass burning in situ in the remote atmosphere. Soot absorbs solar radiation and hence is a very potent greenhouse agent, and its reliable measurements have posed a technical challenge. The new instrument was built with technical input from LANL and in partnership with Droplet Measurement Technologies and University of Las Vegas, Reno NV. A prototype of the instrument was flown on Navy's Center for Remotely Piloted Vehicles (CIRPAS) Twin Otter aircraft to examine the effects of aerosol pollution on marine clouds off the coast of California in July-August 2005. Claudio Mazzoleni
(ISR-2) and Dubey (EES-6) were able to measure a polluted marine cloud. They determined that about 10% of the soot goes into the cloud water droplets, significantly altering its properties. Results have been submitted for the American Geophysical Union (AGU) fall meeting. The high sensitivity and precision of this new soot instrument also opens up promising new applications for the "stand-off" detection of explosions for DoD and DHS programs.

Two Articles on Earthquake Triggering Published in Nature
Paul Johnson (EES-11) and Xiaoping Jia of the Laboratoire de Physique des Matériaux Divisés et des Interfaces, Université de Marne-la-Vallée, France, published a letter in the October 6 issue of the journal Nature entitled, "Nonlinear dynamics, granular media and dynamic earthquake triggering." In the letter, Johnson and Jia note that several large earthquakes have been shown to induce dynamic earthquake triggering at remote distances and in the near-source region as aftershocks. The focus of the article is on the physical origin of dynamic triggering, one of the least understood aspects of earthquake nucleation. Johnson and Jia argue that dynamic triggering may be explained by the dynamic, elastic-nonlinear behavior of fault gouge perturbed by a seismic wave. They base their hypothesis on recent laboratory dynamic experiments conducted in granular media, a fault gouge surrogate. From these they infer that, if the fault is weak, seismic waves cause the fault core modulus to decrease abruptly and weaken it further. If the fault is already near failure, this process could therefore induce fault slip. The publication is based on ongoing experiments conducted by Johnson and Jia in France. The DOE Office of Basic Energy Science, IGPP and CNRS France support the work.

A second publication in Nature, a Brief Communication entitled, "Dynamic
Triggering of Earthquakes," by Joan Gomberg of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) (Memphis) and Paul Johnson of EES-11 was published in the same issue. Gomberg and Johnson show supportive evidence for the above model based on observations of the relation between seismic wave amplitudes and triggered earthquakes. They find that the peak dynamic wave strains scale both with distance from and magnitude of the triggering earthquakes, and that, in agreement with laboratory observations, these deformations correlate with the onset of dynamically induced elastic nonlinearity. The work is funded by the DOE Office of Basic Energy Science, IGPP, and the USGS.

Yucca Mountain Repository Tours
EES-7 staff conducted several tours of Yucca Mountain Repository the week of September 19. "Tours" at Yucca Mountain consist of a general briefing of the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). The briefings are conducted in an underground excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps/displays and is about 160 meters (175 yards) underground.

On September 19, Bruce Reinert briefed a group of nine visitors from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste). They are checking on the progress of the project. This tour also included a trip to the Drift Scale Test about 2800 meters into the tunnel where a test on the effects of long term heating of the repository rock is being conducted.

On September 20, Bruce Reinert briefed representatives of the Nuclear Energy Institute, members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and Representatives from the Alabama State Legislature. The group was interested in the progress of the Project; the States have nuclear power plants.

On September 20, BRIAN DOZIER briefed a group of 39 members with the Association of Engineering Geologists (AEG). The member of the AEG were attending a national meeting in Las Vegas.

On September 21, BRUCE REINERT briefed a large group of 43 members of the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI); Low Level Waste Forum. The NEI were attending a conference in Las Vegas.

On September 21, DICK KOVACH briefed 29 representatives from AREVA (a French company; a worldwide leader in energy) and 11 managers and engineers from the Nuclear Energy Institute (First Energy Corporation). The AREVA is considering building a nuclear power plant in the U.S.

September 14, 2005

Roberts (EES-11) publishes invited paper in Acoustical Physics
A special volume of the prestigious Russian journal Akustichesky Zhurnal, devoted to papers on "Elastic Wave Effects on Fluids in Porous Media," was published in 2005. Peter Roberts of EES-
11 was invited to publish a paper (in English) in this special volume by the Russian Special Editor, Igor Esipov. The paper was published simultaneously in the English journal, Acoustical Physics, which is rarely done. The paper reports key results of laboratory fluid flow experiments during low-frequency dynamic stress cycling of a Berea sandstone core sample. A major conclusion of the paper was that seismic-frequency stress oscillations can cause redistribution of
flowing immiscible fluids within the rock that indicates increased mobility of the non-wetting fluid phase, which in this case was oil. These observations have major implications for the possible mechanisms controlling seismic stimulation for enhanced oil reservoir production. The reference is given below. This topic is of intense interest by petroleum companies due to the fact that a majority of oil in a reservoir is currently unrecoverable and is left in place when a reservoir is abandoned. Finding an approach for increasing the amount of petroleum that can be recovered from a reservoir could have significant impact on global petroleum production.
Roberts, P.M. (2005). Laboratory Observations of Altered Porous Fluid-Flow Behavior in Berea
Sandstone Induced by Low-Frequency Dynamic Stress Stimulation, Acoustical Physics, 51, Suppl. 1, S140-S148, Invited Paper. Simultaneously published also in the Russian edition
Journal, Akustichesky Zhurnal, 51, Suppl.,160-168.

Los Alamos Microdrilling Team drills 1300 ft deep microhole at Tea Pot Dome Field: Demonstration of Microholes for Emplacement of Subsurface Seismic Instrumentation
The EES-11 drilling team has successfully upgraded their coiled-tubing deployed microdrilling unit to support high-pressure drilling. In addition, they increased the tubing-reel capacity to support the
capability for drilling microholes up to 1500-ft deep. The coiled -tubing unit that is used to insert the drilling assemblies in the hole previously had capacity of 900 ft of 1-in. OD tubing. After all of the
required modifications to the coiled-tubing unit were completed, 1650 ft of coiled tubing was installed on the unit, and the high-pressure side of the drilling fluid circulation system was successfully pressure-tested to 6000 psi in order to support future drilling operations of up to 5000 psi with the modified piping system. The higher pressure-capability is important because the power required to drill with coiled tubing is transported to the downhole assembly in the fluid. Because
the allowable flow rate in a microhole is very low to prevent erosion, high-pressure fluid is needed to overcome the friction inside the longer reel of coiled tubing, and provide the downhole hydraulic
power required for deeper, high-performance drilling.

The modified drilling-unit was redeployed to Tea Pot Dome Field to drill the last of a four-well microdrilling program to provide microinstrumentation wells for the microseismic-array
emplacement to monitor the planned CO2 injection and storage demonstration. A prototype highperformance drilling assembly was successfully demonstrated on the modified coiled-tubing unit. The drilling-fluid system was operated at pressures between 3000 psi and 3500 psi; previously the maximum operating pressure was 2000 psi. The fourth microhole was drilled to a depth of 1310 ft where drilling was suspended after the failure of the third drilling motor expended the inventory of motors. Prompt replacement motors and repair of our existing motors was not feasible in the current oil-field activity level. Therefore the well was cased with 1.25-in.-casing, and cemented
with a low-density cement slurry of Portland cement and glass microbubbles.

The drilling team achieved three breakthroughs: the maximum hole depth drill was increased from 820 ft to 1310 ft, the maximum drill-fluid pressure was increased from 2000 psi to 3500 psi, and the
first low-density cement slurry was successfully applied to a microwell. The team was supported by The Rocky Mountain Oil Testing Center staff that operates the Tea Pot Dome field. They provided the high-pressure drilling fluid pump used for the demonstration, and also provided a pulling unit to run casing and fish the prototype drilling assembly. The LANL team completed two wells with PVC casing, and two wells with steel oilfield tubing. A team lead by Ernest Majer from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory will field microinstrumentation arrays in the four microholes, and compare the quality of the seismic data of both the PVC and steel completions with data from surface and downhole instrumentation run in former Tea Pot Dome production and injection wells.

EES-11 and New Mexico Test Complete Spallation Drilling Demonstration
New Mexico Tech has recently completed a number of design changes on their flame-jetburner assembly that resulted in stable burner performance at the fuel and air flows needed to produce the supersonic exhaust from the burner's nozzle that produces the high heat-transfer rate needed for efficient spallation rates. The design of flame-jet burners requires both application of process engineering and trail-and-error methods to achieve good burner performance, and the Tech team has worked through a demanding design campaign to achieve the result. The Los Alamos Team designed and fabricated a 200-ft long coiled-tubing string that includes concentric stainless-steel tubing strings that produce separate conduits for fuel, compressed air, and cooling water, and a telemetry cable to support downhole sensors and a spark igniter in the burner assembly.

The team designed a piping manifold that will be used to feed the top end of the coiled tubing, and developed a concept for a design of a connector sub that will be used to connect the NM Tech burner to the bottom end of the coiled tubing, and feed the fuel, air, cooling water, and telemetry cable into the appropriate conduits on the burner. The team is preparing to resume the final design of the coiled-tubing connector sub as soon as the flame-jet burner design is finalized. A special tubing reel has been dedicated to support spallation drilling, and a special rotary union was procured to supply the feed manifold that will be assembled inside the reel core. The reel will be installed on the coiled-tubing unit, and the 200-ft-long coiled tubing will be installed on the reel before the flame-jet burner assembly can be attached to the bottom end of the coiled tubing. Los Alamos must finish the design of the connector sub before the first demonstration of the burner on coiled tubing can be conducted. Another remaining task is to develop a spark igniter and power supply that are compatible with the NM Tech burner-assembly design and the Los Alamos coiled-tubing telemetry cable and concentric-tubing configuration.

September 7, 2005

Special Section of Vadose Zone Journal Devoted to LANL Hydrogeology
A series of peer-reviewed journal articles has recently been published on the hydrogeology of the LANL site in a special section of Vadose Zone Journal. The special section, edited by Brent Newman, EES-2, and Bruce Robinson, EES-6, consists of 18 research articles and one overview paper. The papers present noteworthy scientific findings that have been developed from past and current LANL environmental remediation and groundwater investigations at LANL, and as such, greatly expand the underpinning scientific base available for environmental decision-making related to groundwater beneath Los Alamos. More broadly, the articles make important contributions to the understanding of the hydrology of semi-arid regions. The special section can be found at: http://vzj.scijournals.org/content/vol4/issue3/

World Nuclear University Tours Yucca Mountain
On August 18, Dick Kovach and Bruce Reinert, EES-7, conducted a tour and briefing of the Yucca Mountain Repository for 28 members of the World Nuclear University.  The 28 visitors were from universities, laboratories, and agencies in the United States, Turkey, Sweden, China, India, Slovak, Lithuania, Armenia, Canada, France, Italy, Argentina, and Hungary.  The information included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout.

The Mesopause as a Physical Penetration Boundary for Meteoroids Doug ReVelle (EES-2) has analyzed the entry behavior of all known types of meteoroids using a single-body end height model to test entry penetration into the earth's middle and upper atmosphere.  He used a new physically based model that incorporates a number of new features including a total power budget during entry as well as the very important processes of ablation and deceleration.  He examined the meteoroid sizes and masses that are capable of terminating their visible flight in the Mesopause.  The Mesopause is the boundary region above which the air temperature and corresponding pressure and density scale heights continually increase with height as the upper atmosphere of the earth merges with the very high temperature outer atmosphere of the sun. The Mesopause influx rate (number of meteors versus mass per year over the entire earth) was predicted using the known meteor groups and the total influx predicted by either satellite data or by using infrasound data alone.  Shallower entry angles allowed much larger meteoroids to penetrate down to the Mesopause.  A comparison with data from a recent Leonid bolide provided additional ground-truth calibration of the model results for an extreme case of entry conditions at an extremely high entry velocity. This research has been published. Reference: Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics vol 67, 1159-1170 (2005)

August 31, 2005

EES and OEEI Launch Research Experience in Carbon Sequestration (RECS) 
On July 17-29, 2005, LANL hosted second program in geological carbon sequestration.  Long term storage, carbon capture, and monitoring, mitigation, and verification (MMV) were highlighted in the two week program held for 20 graduate students from US, Canada, and Mexico. The program took place at the College of Santa Fe and at the Kinder Morgan oil field (SACROC) in Synder Texas and was broken up into 1/3 presentation/lecture, 1/3 fieldwork and demonstrations, and 1/3 student presentation and participation events. Melissa Miller (PI of project, OEEI), Julianna Fessenden (co-director, EES-6), George Guthrie (technical lead, OEEI), Scott Baldridge (technical expert, EES-11), Ann Bustos-Gonzales (logistics lead, OEEI), Gary Geernaert (advisor, IGPP), Deb Rivera (logistics aide, IGPP), Hari Viswanathan (modeling lead, EES-6), Phil Stauffer (modeling lead, EES-6), Rajesh Pawar (modeling expert, EES-6), Bill Carey (geochemical expert, EES-6), Andy Newman (geophysics expert, EES-9), and John Kaszuba (C Division) were involved with the highly successful program. The program was sponsored by the DOE Fossil Energy and LANL's Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP).

EES, ENV, and USGS Teach 6th-8th Graders about Environmental Science in the Valles Caldera
On June 14-17, 2005, LANL hosted second environmental education program for kids within the accord pueblos. Santa Clara, San Ildefonso, Jemez, and Cochi Pueblos sent 5-6 kids for a 4-day long workshop up in the Valles Caldera. On the first day, the kids learned about the local geology from Chris Bradley (EES-11), the soil properties from Mike Ebinger (EES-2) and the local plants from Julianna Fessenden (EES-6) and how to determine plant cover and soil texture from Nancy Kanjorski (Science Education Solutions teacher). On the second day, the kids learned about water chemistry from Armand Groffman (ENV Division), the regional watershed from Chris Echohawk (EES-9), air chemistry from Thom Rahn (EES-6) and performed some experiments on determining water chemistry, flow and profiling from Nancy Kanjorski (SES). On the third day, the kids learned about the land and aquatic bugs from Bob Parmenter and other Valles Caldera staff members. On the fourth day, the kids learned about the regional ecology, fire history, and plant successions from Craig Allen (USGS) and Will Barnes (plant expert) as well as learned about their own histories from 2 elders who joined us from the pueblos. The program was a large success with much media coverage in the local New Mexican papers and was funded by the Government Relations Office at LANL. Elmer Torres (GRO), Barbara Grimes (GRO), Vanessa Del La Cruz (CRO), and Julianna Fessenden (EES-6) organized this program.

Dr. Barb Dutrow Elected Vice-president of the Mineralogical Society of America
Dr. Barb Dutrow, an affiliate who has works at LANL part of the year funded by a DOE Basic Energy Science (BES) grant, was elected vice-president of the Mineralogical Society of America (MSA) for the 2006 term. She will become MSA president for the 2007 term. The BES grant at LANL supporting collaboration with Bryan Travis, EES-11 and Carl Gable, EES-6, is directed at understanding and deciphering thermal-chemical-mechanical feedback relationships inherent in fluid-rock interactions in the crust and evaluating the time-dependent behavior of fluid flow driven by thermal and chemical buoyancy and the resultant mineralogical and chemical changes. Dr. Dutrow is the Adolphe G. Gueymard Professor of Geology in the Department of Geology and Geophysics, Louisiana State University.

EES organizes the 10th International Workshop on Nonlinear Elasticity in Materials, sponsored by IGPP (Los Alamos)
The XIWNEM, co-organized by Donatella Pasqualini (EES-9) and Paul Johnson (EES-11), was held 24-30 July 2005 in Taormina, Sicily. Over 25 individuals attended the workshop, including TJ Ulrich (post doc in EES-11), Fred Pearce (graduate student in EES-11) and Aviva Sussman (EES-11). Other attendees included individuals from the US, France, Belgium, UK, Italy, Czech Republic, Hungary, and Sweden. The aim of the annular workshop is for the core group of researchers working worldwide on this topic to have the opportunity to meet, exchange information, and plan the next year's work. The general goals of this workshop were to discuss recent findings regarding the elastic nonlinear behavior of solids, including basic research in geomaterials and other solids; applications to nondestructive evaluation of solids; earthquake strong ground motion; dynamic earthquake triggering; medical diagnostic applications; nonlinear imaging; and nonlinear time-reversal. Outcomes of the workshop included a CD summary of presentations distributed EES to participants and interested parties. Work at LANL on this topic is sponsored by DOE/OBES, IGPP, DP and LDRD.

Article Published in the June 2005 Issue of Meteoritics & Planetary Science
When Genesis, a manmade space capsule, plummeted to Earth after the complete failure of its dual parachute system, Revelle (EES-2) and collaborators used this opportunity to use measurements of the "hypersonic boom" from reentry and assess the degree of reliability of previously developed reactions for natural meteors and bolides to analyze these infrasonic data. The results of this research have recently been published; Revelle, D.O., W. Edwards, and T.D. Sandoval, "Genesis-An artificial, low velocity "meteor" fall and recovery: September 8, 2004," Meteoritics & Planetary Science, 40 (6), 895-916 (2005). Abstract available online at http://meteoritics.org

Briefings and Tours of Yucca Mountain Repository
On August 23, a delegation from the Department of Energy, Office of the Secretary of Energy, were briefed by Dick Kovach (EES-7). The information included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout. This tour also included a trip to the Drift Scale Test about 2800 meters into the tunnel where a test on the effects of long term heating of the repository rock is being conducted.

On August 25, Bruce Reinert of EES-7, hosted two groups visiting the Yucca Mountain Repository. The U.S. Congressional Staff included U.S. Senator Robert Bennett and Mark Morrison, Legislative Director. The second group, from Taiwan, consisted of 20 representatives from Taipei Economic and Cultural Office, The Legislative Yuan of ROC, and the National Science Council. The information included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout.

August 17 & 24, 2005

LANL Distinguished Performance Large Team Award
The SHAVANO Team was tasked to provide a high fidelity primary implosion code to support the W-76 Lifetime Extension Program. This work included major progress in developing simulation capability, demonstration of new physics models, and demonstration of a preliminary 2-D implosion calculation for the primary.  The team not only met designers’ certification strategy requirements, but also set a new and defendable standard for project management, testing, and release management. The code now plays a prominent role in the certification process.  Team members receiving the award are Thomas Canfield (T-3), Theodore Carney (EES-11), Paul Maudlin (T-3), and Sam Shaw (T-14); and employees in X, CCN, and ESA.   

Asteroids, Comets, Meteors and Trans-Neptunian Objects Conference
Douglas ReVelle (EES-2) attended the Asteroids, Comets, Meteors and Trans-Neptunian Objects (from the Kuiper Belt) Conference held in Buzios, Brazil (near Rio de Janeiro) from August 7-12, 2005. This conference is only held once very 3 years worldwide. It was at the last such conference in Berlin, Germany where ReVelle was awarded the honor of having an asteroid named after him (Asteroid Number 13358 ReVelle- see http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/ ). ReVelle presented one of the five oral talks on meteors at the conference and also presented two posters on the field of infrasound from bolides (exploding meteors).

The oral presentation,  “ ‘Listening’ to Very Bright Shower Meteors” described infrasonic/subaudible detection at ground level of very bright shower meteors (with panchromatic stellar magnitudes ranging from about -8 to -14, at very high altitudes from 80-110 km. For reference the moon has a brightness of -12.5 and this brightness is expressed on a logarithmic scale like the seismic Richter magnitude scale for earthquakes.

A poster presentation, “Estimation of Bolide Energy using Observed Infrasound Signals” described new infrasonic/subaudible wave propagation amplitude analyses that have been made of bolides that have been detected by both infrasound and satellite detectors at horizontal ranges from 400-14000 km from the event with source energies from 0.01 to > 30 kt (TNT equivalent charge weight). The research enables more accurate assessment of the source energy of the bolides detected both infrasonically and in the optical electromagnetic spectrum region, including the significance of source altitude effects.

The poster presentation,  “The September 3rd 2004, Antarctic Bolide: Luminosity Modeling and Infrasound Location Analyses” covered research in press in Nature (August 25th, 2005 edition). A very large meteor (10 m across initially) entered over Antarctica on September 3, 2004. The meteor had a very unusual Aten type orbit (whose aphelion is at the Earth’ distance from the sun and lies entirely inside the orbit of the Earth, where no-one is looking for large potentially dangerous impacting object). The event was recorded by US DoD satellites in the optical and in the infrared parts of the electromagnetic spectrum as well as seismically, by 5 arrays of the IMS (International Monitoring System) infrasound network, by a ground based lidar system operated by the Australian government in Antarctica, by the NASA MODIS satellite instrument (an orbiting interferometer) and was “seen” as the fragmentation debris cloud cast shadows on to the ice sheet. The nearest Japanese field station in Antarctica also took ice samples just after the event which are still being processed for recovering meteorite debris. Entry modeling provided by ReVelle shows that about 200 of the initial 800 tons of ordinary chondrite material survived entry and plunged into the sea ice zone of the NW Antarctic Ocean.

Figure 1. NASA MODIS satellite (orbiting interferometer) view of fragmentation debris cloud shadows over ice sheets.

Earth and Environmental Sciences Division’s SAGE School Success
Imagine discovering a hogback ridge buried beneath the modern land surface with no clue to the former presence of this topographic feature. Imaging discovering that a major fault (the La Bajada) with hundreds of meters of vertical offset is not where geologists had mapped it but instead was kilometers away, or that only 100 meters beneath the ground surface of a barren valley was an aquifer of fresh water. This is what thirty students from around the U.S. and six other countries discovered at SAGE this past summer. With support from the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, Los Alamos, and several companies, SAGE (the Summer of Applied Geophysical Experience) operated for the 23rd consecutive year to train undergraduate and graduate students in geophysical field methods. For the second year, five students from Cochiti Pueblo and one from the Navajo Nation were also involved in the field geophysical work, assisting and learning about applications of geophysical exploration.  SAGE, sponsored by the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, was held from June 20 to July 15. Participating from EES Division, were Scott Baldridge, SAGE Codirector, and Aviva Sussman. In addition to training and education, SAGE also provides students with career opportunities, including an introduction to opportunities at Los Alamos.  Several former SAGE students work at the Laboratory this summer as student interns.

EES-12 Provides Briefings and Tours of Yucca Mountain Repository
On August 11, 2005, Dick Kovach, EES-7, hosted a group of 37 visitors from the Department of Justice and the Department of Energy at the Yucca Mountain Repository on the Nevada Test Site. The briefing included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout. This tour also included a trip to the Drift Scale Test about 2800 meters into the tunnel where a test on the effects of long-term heating of the repository rock is being conducted.

Utah State Representative, Jim Gowans; Utah State Senator, Brent Goodfellow; and a group of Tooele County Officials visited the Yucca Mountain repository on August 8, 2005. Tooele County, Utah is South West of Salt Lake City, UT. The County includes Wendover Airbase, which was the training ground for the 509th Composite Group that dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Bruce Reinert of EES-7 provided a briefing that included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout.

EES and OEEI Launch Research Experience in Carbon Sequestration (RECS) 
On July 17-29, 2005, LANL hosted second program in geological carbon sequestration.  Long term storage, carbon capture, and monitoring, mitigation, and verification (MMV) were highlighted in the two week program held for 20 graduate students from US, Canada, and Mexico.  The program took place at the College of Santa Fe and at the Kinder Morgan oil field (SACROC) in Synder Texas and was broken up into 1/3 presentation/lecture, 1/3 fieldwork and demonstrations, and 1/3 student presentation and participation events.  Melissa Miller (PI of project, OEEI), Julianna Fessenden (co-director, EES-6), George Guthrie (technical lead, OEEI), Scott Baldridge (technical expert, EES-11), Ann Bustos-Gonzales (logistics lead, OEEI), Gary Geernaert (advisor, IGPP), Deb Rivera (logistics aide, IGPP), Hari Viswanathan (modeling lead, EES-6), Phil Stauffer (modeling lead, EES-6), Rajesh Pawar (modeling expert, EES-6), Bill Carey (geochemical expert, EES-6), Andy Newman (geophysics expert, EES-9), and John Kaszuba (C Division) were involved with the highly successful program.  The program was sponsored by the DOE Fossil Energy and LANL’s Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP).

EES, ENV, and USGS Teach 6th-8th Graders about Environmental Science in the Valles Caldera
On June 14-17, 2005, LANL hosted second environmental education program for kids within the accord pueblos.  Santa Clara, San Ildefonso, Jemez, and Cochi Pueblos sent 5-6 kids for a 4-day long workshop up in the Valles Caldera.  On the first day, the kids learned about the local geology from Chris Bradley (EES-11), the soil properties from Mike Ebinger (EES-2) and the local plants from Julianna Fessenden (EES-6) and how to determine plant cover and soil texture from Nancy Kanjorski (Science Education Solutions teacher).  On the second day, the kids learned about water chemistry from Armand Groffman (ENV Division), the regional watershed from Chris Echohawk (EES-9), air chemistry from Thom Rahn (EES-6) and performed some experiments on determining water chemistry, flow and profiling from Nancy Kanjorski (SES).  On the third day, the kids learned about the land and aquatic bugs from Bob Parmenter and other Valles Caldera staff members.  On the fourth day, the kids learned about the regional ecology, fire history, and plant successions from Craig Allen (USGS) and Will Barnes (plant expert) as well as learned about their own histories from 2 elders who joined us from the pueblos.  The program was a large success with much media coverage in the local New Mexican papers and was funded by the Government Relations Office at LANL.  Elmer Torres (GRO), Barbara Grimes (GRO), Vanessa Del La Cruz (CRO), and Julianna Fessenden (EES-6) organized this program.

August 10, 2005

EES Hosts 4th Workshop on Community Finite Element Models (CFEM) for Fault Systems and Tectonic Studies
On July 11-14, 20205, the fourth annual CFEM workshop, and the third to be held at LANL, was hosted by Carl Gable, LANL EES-6, Mark Simons, Caltech, and Brad Hager, MIT and was attended by forty five researchers from universities, national laboratories and government agencies. The workshop was sponsored by the LANL Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP), National Science Foundation, Southern California Earthquake Center (NSF SCEC), National Science Foundation, Computational Infrastructure for Geodynamics (NSF CIG), and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

The workshop served as a venue to discuss progress in numerical modeling of lithospheric deformation, benchmarking existing codes, and defining the challenges that need to be met for future software development. Particular attention was placed on issues associated with meshing of complex domains, computational frameworks, solution methods well adapted to Methods Passing Interface (MPI) environments, and to the definition of rigorous benchmarks. Daily activities were partitioned between formal presentations/discussions and informal time for hands-on tinkering with algorithms. Activities included presentations by Andreas Plesch, Harvard Univ. on the state of the Community Fault Block Model (CBM) for Southern California; tutorials on the Geophysical Finite Element Simulation Tool (GeoFEST) by Greg Lyzenga, Harvey Mudd; and a tutorial on Lithomop by Charles Williams, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Brad Hager, MIT led the benchmarking activities. Carl Gable, David Coblentz, and Noah Fay of LANL, presented tutorials in the use of LaGriT and Cubit for mesh generation. Matt Knaply, ANL, discussed Portable Extensible Tool Kit for Scientific Computation (PETSc) and finite element data structures. A document outlining the software infrastructure needs of the short term lithospheric deformation community will be prepared by Brad Aagard, USGS, and submitted to CIG for consideration. 

Successful Surveillance of EES-12 Quality Assurance Program
On July 26 and 27, a team of auditors from the DOE Carlsbad Field Office (CBFO) Technical Assistance Contractor (CTAC) conducted a surveillance of the EES-12 (LANL Carlsbad Operations) QA Program to evaluate the adequacy, effectiveness, and implementation of the EES-12 procurement process.  This surveillance was a follow-up to the successful DOE/CBFO audit in February 2005 of the EES-12 QA Program Plan and implementing procedures.  The EES-12 QA Program must comply with the rigorous quality requirements of the DOE/CBFO Quality Assurance Program Document (QAPD) in order to support the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (30 miles southeast of Carlsbad, NM).  Laurie Sparks, Don Reed, and Sherry Yeager, all of EES-12, prepared for, and participated in the surveillance.  The result was a very successful surveillance, resulting in no findings.  This surveillance result, coupled with the successful audit in February (also resulting in no findings), has resulted in a CBFO-approved, QAPD-compliant EES-12 QA Program and is an outstanding achievement for the new EES-12 QA program.

Runaway Breakdown Theory Gains Momentum
In 1996 Robert Roussel-Dupre authored a paper that connected the theory of runaway breakdown with high-altitude discharges, also known as red sprites. Now that measurements are beginning to support this theory, Bob has been highly sought as an expert in this field of lightning. This summer he gave a series of invited talks in several countries: one at the Multiscale Nature of Spark Precursors and High-altitude Lightning workshop in Leiden Netherlands in May; two at 2005 Coupled Atmospheric Layers (CAL) workshop in Crete, Greece in June; one at the Coupling, Energetics and Dynamics of Atmospheric Regions (CEDAR) conference in Santa Fe, NM in June; and one at the International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy (IAGA) conference in Toulouse, France in July. He is also working with an international team to launch a French micro-satellite that would yield additional information on the role that runaway breakdown plays in the physics of red sprites. At Los Alamos Bob is joined by a team of EES scientists dedicated to unraveling the mysteries of lightning initiation and the ensuing discharge process. This team includes Drs. Eugene Symbalisty, Laurie Triplett, Heidi Tierney, Jonah Colman, Bryan Travis, and Zhen Huang.

EES Student Wins Outstanding Presentation Award at LANL Symposium
Jonathan MacCarthy (EES-11 GRA student) received an Outstanding Poster Award in the Earth and Space Category for his presentation "Seismic Waveform Classification for Automatic Detection and Improved Location of Volcanic Events."

August 3, 2005

Drilling Program Begins to Characterize Buried Volcanoes near Yucca Mountain
Drilling of buried basaltic volcanoes in alluvial-filled basins surrounding Yucca Mountain began this week as part of an integrated geophysics/drilling program, sponsored by the Yucca Mountain Project, to more completely characterize the volcanic history of the Yucca Mountain region for probabilistic volcanic hazard studies. EES Division is the lead organization for the program. Frank Perry (EES-9) is the Principal Investigator for probability studies and drilling; Allen Cogbill (EES-11) is the Principal Investigator for geophysics (aeromagnetic survey); and EES-7 staff in Las Vegas are coordinating all test activities. Samples recovered by the drilling will be analyzed to determine their age and chemical composition to better understand the timing, location, and characteristics of volcanism in the region. Ten drill holes are planned with drilling targets ("magnetic anomalies") selected and prioritized from a population of about 30 potential buried volcanoes identified from a high-resolution aeromagnetic survey that was completed in 2004. Depths to the buried lava flows are estimated to range from about 50 to 200 meters. Results of the drilling will be used to derive new estimates of the probability of a volcanic disruption of the proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain through a formal expert elicitation currently being sponsored by DOE.

EDOTX for Attribution Team Receives Distinguished Performance Award
The EDOTX team has advanced the state of the art in Domestic Nuclear Event Attribution (DNEA) through innovative science combining atmospheric physics, nuclear weapons effects and nuclear weapons design, and has enabled a major advance in the national capability to determine the perpetrator of a nuclear attack against the United States.  The team developed concepts of operations for a testbed and demonstrated the practicality of the instrumentation approach in real-world settings under particularly onerous circumstances. This project is providing the foundation for an entirely new national capability.,Team member receiving the award are Morrie Pongratz (ISR-2) (Retired), Kalpak A. Dighe (ISR-2), Alfred B. Fernandez (ISR-2), Jeremiah D. Harlin (ISR-2), M. William (Bill) Johnson (N-2), William Junor (ISR-2), Matt Wayne Kirkland (X-4), Michael R. MacInnes (X-2), Ronald W. Moses, Jr. (T-3) (Retired), Aaron C. Musfeldt (ISR-2), Amy H. Regan (ISR-4), Robert Roussel-Dupre (EES-2), Xuan-Min Shao (ISR-2), Skyler David Speakman (ISR-2), Mark A. Stanley (ISR-2), Heidi E. Tierney (EES-2), Laurie A. Triplett (EES-2), Inez Valdez (ISR-2), Charles W. Wilkerson, Jr. (X-2).

July 27, 2005

Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team Activities in Washington
Scientists from the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division (EES) participated in the Defense Threat Reduction Agency's, Interagency Geotechnical Assessment Team (IGAT) Review and Planning meeting held in Arlington, VA during the week of July 11th. The IGAT provides support to STRATCOM and others in the form of site-specific and regional geological characterizations. The meeting focused on the details of integrating material property information into 3-d geologic models to be used in ground shock modeling with special emphasis on the upcoming Divine Strake experiment at NTS. EES participants were David Coblentz and Aviva Sussman. During the first part of the week Sussman participated in a peer-review subgroup meeting of the IGAT's Country Template Working Group that develops data on specific locations of interest.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission Tours Yucca Mountain Repository
A group of 17 managers, engineers, and students from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) toured Yucca Mountain Repository on July 21, 2005. Bruce Reinert, EES-7, conducted the tour, which consisted of a general briefing of the tunnel/repository layout and experiments (both completed and ongoing). The briefings are conducted in an underground excavation off the main tunnel called an Alcove. This Alcove has been customized for tours, including maps/displays and is about 160 meters (175 yards) underground.  This tour also included a trip to the Drift Scale Test about 2800 meters into the tunnel where a test on the effects of long term heating of the repository rock is being conducted.

EES Hosts Protocell Science Coordination Workshop
Steen Rasmussen, EES-6, hosted a protocell science coordination workshop as part of the ongoing Programmable Artificial Cell Evolution/Protocell Assembly (PACE/PA) collaboration.  The workshop was held at LANL on July 19-22, 2005. The workshop focused on the following: The question is not whether new simple life-forms can be assembled from scratch, but under which conditions it can occur.  The European Commission EC sponsored PACE project together with the Los Alamos sponsored (LDRD-DR) PA project seek to develop the underpinning science for the assembly of functional protocells, i.e., simple self-reproducing nanosystems that can perform useful tasks.

July 20, 2005

Chipera Gives Invited Paper at The Clay Minerals Society 42nd Annual Meeting
EES's Steve Chipera presented an invited paper entitled "Quantitative XRD analyses of samples containing disordered materials using full XRD patterns" at the 42nd annual meeting of The Clay Minerals Society, held in Burlington Vermont, June 11-15, 2005. The Clay Minerals Society is an International scientific organization devoted to the study and utilization of clay minerals. The Society publishes the journal Clays and Clay Minerals, which the LANL library subscribes to and several staff members in EES-6 have published in.  For more information go to www.clays.org.

Chipera also serves the Society as one of the "Ask a Clay Scientist," where K-12 students (and others) can ask questions about clay, properties, uses, etc. http://www.clays.org/AskTheClayScientist/AskTheClayScientist.html

EES Staff Member Appointed an Adjunct Science Team Member
Manvendra Dubey, in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, has been appointed an Adjunct Science Team Member of DOE's Atmospheric Science Program (ASP). The ASP, part of the Office of Science, is a $15-20M/yr program focused on reducing uncertainties in climate effects of anthropogenic aerosols. This is a sister program to DOE's Atmospheric Radiation Monitoring (ARM) program, with much synergy between them. The ASP program coordinates a variety of multi-agency field campaigns to focus on key questions. One such campaign is ongoing in California to study marine stratus clouds and another will happen in Mexico City next year. Dubey's team will be measuring black carbon during these campaigns. The campaigns will be generating a wealth of data on air pollution, cloud properties, and radiation that will be invaluable to test and validate processes in climate models. Dubey will be representing LANL capabilities in this area to this DOE Office of Science Program.

Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Mobile Facility Media Day
EES Division attended what was dubbed as "media day" to dedicate the ARM Mobile Facility (AMF) on 30 June in Point Reyes, California. Those in attendance from LANL were EES Acting Division Leader, Tina Behr-Andres; EES-2 Acting Group Leader, Michael Ebinger; and TWP/AMF Management Office Team Leader, Larry Jones. The AMF is a high profile climate monitoring facility that is designed to be deployed anywhere in the world, specifically in under-sampled areas of scientific interest. The purpose of the facility is to collect long-term, continuous, quality data for use in improving Global Climate Models. The event was also attended by scientists from other National Laboratories and was covered by the San Francisco ABC affiliate.

In collaboration with the U.S. Office of Naval Research and DOE's Aerosol Science Program, the objectives of the Marine Stratus, Radiation, Aerosol and Drizzle project at Point Reyes are to make observations of cloud aerosol interactions and improve understanding of cloud organization often associated with patches of drizzle. The AMF will contribute significantly to the scientific objectives of this project by providing state-of-the-art active and passive remote sensors to measure the detailed microphysical structure of drizzle patches and the associated clouds as they move onshore. The AMF will collect data for seven months at Point Reyes before being packed up and transported to its next assignment in Niamey, Niger to participate in the international African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis (AMMA) Intensive Operational Period (IOP) in 2006. The AMF is deployed, operated, and maintained by the TWP/AMF Management Office team in EES-2.

July 13, 2005

EES Scientist Gives Talk at Institute of Geological Sciences of the Free University of Berlin
Tom Shankland, Laboratory Associate in EES-11, gave an invited talk at the Institut der Geologischen Wissenschaften der Freien Universität Berlin [Institute of Geological Sciences of the Free University of Berlin] on the topic: "Heat Transfer in Upper Mantle Minerals at High Pressure and Temperature". Shankland is currently finishing his tenure at the GeoForschungsZentrum (GFZ) in Potsdam as a Preisträger [Award Winner] of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.  The GFZ uses a broad spectrum of methods and techniques, such as satellite geodesy and remote sensing, geophysical deep sounding, scientific drilling, experiments under in situ conditions, and numerical modeling to investigate properties and processes in the Earth. Shankland is currently working on heat transport in minerals. In August he will give a talk on "Hydrogen Diffusivity and Electrical Conductivity of Mantle Minerals" at the GFZ.

LANL Distinguished Performance Award
The LANL team that helped to negotiate the recently signed Order on Consent from the New Mexico Environment Department received a 2004 LANL Distinguished Performance Award.  Don Hickmott, Danny Katzman, and Dave Broxton of EES are part of this team. The Consent Order provides for the comprehensive investigation and cleanup of legacy contamination and ground water monitoring at LANL. The negotiated Consent Order allows LANL to collect $43 million in DOE funding for remediation work. The funding, which could not be allocated without an agreement between NM and DOE, allows clean up of the facility by 2015 - fifteen years early. "This clean up order will protect New Mexicans for generations to come," NM Governor Bill Richardson noted. "It is a tough plan that will ensure our resources, including our precious, limited water, will be cleaned and protected." ENV Division nominated the team, which included twenty-one individuals from across LANL. The team nomination was supported by C.S. Tyler Pryzbylek (Former DOE/NNSA General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer), Ed Wilmott (manager of LASO), and Joe Vozella (LASO assistant manager for Facility Operations).

EES Article Published in Current Issue of Eos
Giday WoldeGabriel, EES-6, has an article in the current issue of Eos (Vol. 86, No. 27, page 255).  The article describes new tephra investigation techniques and their application to unraveling the geodynamic and anthropologic history of the East Africa Rift System.  Tephra is a term used for any material ejected during an explosive volcanic eruption. Tephra studies that provide critical age information place all the geological, paleontological, archeological, and paleoclimatic records in temporal and spatial contexts. The article summarizes the  "Revealing Hominid Origins Initiative International Working Group Workshop," that Giday co-hosted recently in Santa Fe.  The workshop was funded by the NSF Revealing Hominid Origins Initiative, a project of UC-Berkeley. The workshop was augmented by a daylong field trip to the Espanola Basin of the Rio Grande Rift to look at rift-bound tilted Miocene sedimentary deposits with interbedded tephra.  The field trip provided a rare opportunity for East African scientists to compare the older Rio Grande Rift with the younger and more active East African Rift System.

July 6, 2005

Successful OQA audit of the LANL-OSTI QA Program
On Tuesday and Wednesday (June 21 and 22), a team of auditors from the DOE Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCWRM) conducted an audit of LANL Office of Science and Technology & International (OST&I) Program to evaluate the adequacy and effectiveness of the implementation of Quality Assurance Program Plan and implementing procedures.
Cleoves Martinez (EES-9) and John Dinsmoor (EES-7) teamed up to lead the preparation for the audit.  In addition, many of the PIs and researchers from EES and C Divisions who participate in the OST&I program, contributed to the final preparations and answered questions from the auditors.  The result was a very successful audit.  This is an outstanding achievement for a new QA program and everyone associated with the LANL-OSTI program can be proud.

PBS Tours Yucca Mountain
On June 23, Dick Kovak (EES-7) briefed the producer and crew of the PBS series "Big Ideas." PBS is doing a story on Cal-Tech's use of the Global Positioning System at Yucca Mountain to monitor movements of the earths surface.  Brian Wernicke, Chandler Family Professor of Geology, Cal-Tech, was a member of the group.  The information included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout.

Yucca Mountain Tours Conducted in June
On June 28, Dick Kovak and Brian Dozier of EES-7 hosted a group of about 80 representatives of the Nuclear Energy Institute, Utility Workers Union of America. 

On June 29, Dick Kovach (EES-7) briefed a group from Natural Resources Canada, Uranium and Radioactive Waste Division.
Briefings included an included an overview of geology, results of testing activities and repository layout.

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