Associate Labs Director Andy McIlroy retires after over 30 years

“The California site is a unique asset for the Labs and for the nation.”

Just a few weeks away from retirement, Andy McIlroy, associate Labs director for Integrated Security Solutions, is thinking a lot about his time at Sandia California and starting to run into some lasts — last Senior Leadership Team meeting, last time at the California cafeteria — which is a bit strange for a man so focused on firsts.

Take it from the top

Andy has spent more than 30 years at Sandia, starting with two years as a postdoc in the Combustion Research Facility — a facility he would later help run. He came to the Labs after achieving a bachelor’s degree in chemistry with honors and distinction from Harvey Mudd College and a doctorate in chemical physics from the University of Colorado.

He left Sandia in 1993 to take a position with The Aerospace Corporation and become the type of researcher most romanticized by American culture: a rocket scientist.

“I wanted to stay at Sandia because of the incredibly important work and the people here, but there wasn’t really an avenue for that at that time,” Andy said on a rainy morning in February as he recalled his career. “The practice then was that postdocs were never hired by the Labs after their stint was over.”

Andy was happy studying propulsion as a rocket scientist, never thinking his path might return him to Livermore. But in 1997, he got a call that changed his life.

“A mentor of mine, whom I had worked with in CRF, said that he was setting up a new microfluidics program, and they had decided to backfill his position and wanted me to apply,” Andy said. “I didn’t say yes immediately because my wife had a career working as a chemist for a pharmaceutical company. I wasn’t going to just upend her career.”

As it happens, the new microfluidics team needed a biochemist, so there was an opportunity for her as well, and the pair both became Sandians. For Andy, a return to the pure science work of the Combustion Research Facility was a welcome change that held the promise of new opportunities.

Old flame, new discovery

In his scientific career, Andy has authored and co-authored more than 40 papers, but he said one project stands out and brings him the most pride. Andy was part of a team, along with now Senior Manager Craig Taatjes and professor Terry Cool of Cornell University, examining flame chemistry — specifically, the chemistry of combustion intermediates, the chemicals that transform fuel and oxidizer to carbon dioxide and water.

“People had studied combustion for years to understand what is happening inside flames. The area where combustion happens is very small, so it’s hard to sample the chemistry going on within the flame,” Andy said. “It turns out, when you study a reaction in low pressure, the area of combustion stretches as the flame gets lower. It makes it easier to detect what is going on in there.”

The team was able to get access to the Advanced Light Source at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The facility’s intense extreme ultraviolet light enabled detailed measurements without interfering with the chemical reaction. Andy’s job was to design and build a large, yet portable, vacuum system to house the combustion system and custom mass spectrometer used for measurements.

“Of course, portable just meant it could fit in the back of a truck,” Andy said. “But it was really very exciting and was something no one had yet done.”

Andy took over the construction of an already designed system — one that he discovered would never work.

“There had been a fair amount of money invested in it,” Andy said during a Careerapalooza interview on March 4. “Three to six months in, I thought ‘This thing doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to.’ I kept doubting myself because I knew the folks who did the initial design. They were great scientists. I must be doing something wrong here.”

He decided to take a step back and ask how he would design it. He recalled finding a fatal flaw and, after checking his calculations over and over, summoned the courage to suggest radical change.

“It was never going to work the way it was designed,” Andy said. “I had to go back to my manager at the time and tell him, ‘You spent this big chunk of money on this, and it is never going to work. We need to take this big hunk of stainless steel and put it in the bin and start over. As a matter of fact, we shouldn’t just start over, we should completely redesign this from scratch.’”

A move some might see as risky turned out to be a decision that led to a major scientific discovery.

The team discovered a new class of intermediate — compounds that form through combustion — that had only been theorized to exist. Those molecules were previously dismissed by most scientists as something that occurred so fast that, if they existed at all, didn’t matter to the combustion chemistry. The team not only confirmed their presence, they also learned that the chemical was relatively stable and common.

“Craig and Terry had the ah-ha moment, but it wouldn’t have been possible without the ALS and the chamber. It really was discovery through collaboration,” Andy said.

Andy still has a high-resolution image of that experiment, taken from inside the chamber, at his desk to mark his participation in the team that first observed those intermediates inside a combustion event.

Opening Sandia to the world

Andy demonstrated his commitment to discovery through collaboration for the global scientific community in 2011 when, as a senior manager, he helped lead the development of the Livermore Valley Open Campus.

“I worked with (former Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory director) Bill Goldstein,” Andy said. “The best minds in the world don’t come exclusively from the United States. We can get new perspectives and learn about discoveries and methods in other countries.”

While that may seem obvious to many people today, it was a bit of a risk just a decade ago.

“We had to sell our value proposition to the Department of Energy and other federal departments to allow for a place where foreign nationals could come to work. It was risky to propose this, but I think our careers went OK afterward,” Andy said, pointing out his ascension to associate Labs director and Goldstein’s to lab director.

Since its founding, the Livermore Valley Open Campus has hosted hundreds of international scientists, breakthroughs in diesel engine design and biotechnology and the creation of a handheld biochemistry lab.

A special place

The Open Campus on the east side of Sandia California is just one reason the Labs’ Livermore site is special to Andy.

“We are able to do things a little more easily than the larger Labs,” he said. “We were the first to test and institute the 4-10 work schedule. We created the first extreme ultraviolet lithography machine, which ultimately allowed the creation of today’s state-of-the-art chips and more powerful phones and other microelectronics. We are nimble and able to react more quickly to find new efficiencies that benefit the whole Labs.”

Andy jokes that he might end up being known as the “ALD who moved the most dirt” because of the amount of new construction at the California site during his tenure. The new Data Center, started by former Associate Labs Director Dori Ellis, the Sandia Programs Engineering and Assembly Research facility, Limited Area Multi-Program Secure High Bay Laboratory complex and cafeteria are some of the new buildings on the 50-year-old site. Perhaps counterintuitively, Andy said all the additions to the site are actually savings for the American taxpayers.

“We didn’t just build these facilities because the site was aging,” Andy said. “We are leading three nuclear weapons programs here. These updates help us do things more efficiently and ultimately save money. The landscaping was not just to make the site more attractive. The drought tolerant plants save water, which is a precious resource in California, and let us spend less money on maintenance.”

Andy also points out improvements people cannot see, like the upgrades to the water and sewer systems throughout the site. The aging plumbing was leaking into buildings and into the ground, costing money in maintenance and lost water. Upgrading that system will save the Labs money in the years to come but also, Andy points out, each of these site improvements makes Sandia California more efficient, more productive and ensures the site continues to lead by example for generations to come.

“One of the jobs of every ALD for the Integrated Security Solutions Division is to be a steward of the Livermore campus,” Andy said. “This California site is a unique asset for the Labs and the nation. It is a special place where people do extraordinary work.”

Since announcing his retirement in January, Andy has been approached by other Sandians telling him how much he impacted their lives and careers.

“I tell them all the same thing,” Andy said. “It’s easy to support exceptional people.”