Page • .highlight-article { padding: 16px 16px 40px 16px; width: auto 100%; } .lower-btn { position: absolute; bottom: 10px; margin-top: 16px; } .highlight-title { font-size: .8em; } .list-view-block .highlight-title { font-size: 1.2em; } .news-slider-content { color: #212529 !important; } .highlight-next, .highlight-all, .highlight-prev { float: right; } .highlighted-returns { display: inline-block; vertical-align: top;...
Search
Shock Thermodynamic Applied Research Facility (STAR)
Facility • The STAR facility provides a full range of pressure (bars to multi-Mbar) for material property study utilizing gas/propellant launchers, ramp-loading pulsers, and ballistic applications.
Smart materials for highly complex tags with environmental response
News Article, June 22, 2023 • Cover of the Journal of the German Chemical Society Angewandte Chemie International Edition As counterfeiting methods become more sophisticated, countermeasures must be developed at the same pace. In this Sandia LDRD project, unique exemplars of next generation anticounterfeiting optical tags were developed that leverage the luminescent properties of materials for...
Stability of disconnections in solute atmosphere
News Article, March 3, 2025 • Disconnections, such as the disconnection dipole shown here from relaxed molecular dynamics simulations, are found on many grain boundaries and postulated to regulate boundary mobility. (b) An atomic-scale map of the segregation energy of dilute Ag atoms in a Cu matrix illustrating a zone of strong segregation (blue) for preferred...
Statistical earthquake models inform understanding of material degradation at the nanoscale
News Article, December 10, 2024 • Muscovite mica, used in many materials science applications, is known for its extremely flat and flaky layers, making it highly susceptible to hostile environmental conditions. (Photo by Anastasia Ilgen) Understanding how materials will interact with their environment is crucial when selecting components for engineering applications. To help inform material selection, geologists...
Stress intensity thresholds for development of reliable brittle materials
News Article, June 22, 2023 • Cover of the Journal of the American Ceramic Society Brittle material failure can appear random and unpredictable at subcritical stresses. A fundamental understanding of how structural and environmental factors impact fracture propagation is necessary to predict fracture in these systems. Through this project, a physics-based model of glass fracture was...
Strong and flexible interlocking metasurfaces
News Article, April 22, 2024 • Interlocking metasurfaces are a recent Sandia-invented joining technology that may replace other structural joining methods, such as bolts and adhesives. Much like LEGO® bricks (see Figure 1), they are patterned, modular surfaces that constrain motion between two bodies when assembled into a larger structure. Unlike LEGO bricks, they are designed...
Supercomputer Stout brews breakthroughs
News Article, April 10, 2024 • Stout, a new Sandia supercomputer, secured its place on the Top500 computers list that was released Nov. 13. Boasting a performance of 8.9 petaflops, Stout claimed the No. 87 spot on the renowned benchmark list of the world’s fastest computers. Read more about Supercomputer Stout brews breakthroughs
Swarm Control Technology
Page • A Swarm of Robots Swarm behavior in artificial intelligence is explained as a group of robots working together as a team, much like a swarm of bees or ants. Swarm behavior occurs in nature and we try to mimic this behavior in robotic machines. Robotic Vehicle Squads Cooperating squads of...
Testing a photon transport model against real-world experiments for improved simulation accuracy
News Article, July 14, 2025 • Simulated and observed photon travel time agreed within uncertainty across the two cloud thicknesses (1, 2) under study. How long does it take for photons to travel through clouds of particles in the air? Sandia researchers utilized a new photon propagation simulation tool based on the open-source Physically Based Rendering...
The Advanced Memory Technology program kicks off round three with Cerebras
News Article, August 19, 2025 • THE TRI-LABS AND CEREBRAS MEET AT SANDIA – The program and team leads from Sandia, Los Alamos, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories convened at Sandia’s Computer Science Research Institute for a workshop to collaborate in person. (Photo provided by Sandia National Laboratories) Sandia, along with Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos...
The study of Z-pinches with engineered defects
News Article, October 13, 2022 • 3D-magnetohydrodynamic simulations of electrothermal instability growth by studying Z-pinches with engineered defects Electrothermal instability (ETI) is driven by Joule heating and arises from the dependence of resistivity on temperature. When a metal is Joule-heated through the boiling point, ETI drives azimuthally correlated surface density variations or “strata,” which provide the dominant seed...
Thermal Spray Lab (TSL)
Facility • TSL capabilities include traditional thermal spray processes, cold spray, and controlled atmosphere plasma spray, process diagnostics, process modeling, and advanced process control.
Thermal Test Complex (TTC)
Facility • The TTC is used to study quiescent, large-scale combustion events, as well as to assess the effect of wind driven fires. Fires include hydrocarbon liquid, combustible solids, and propellant fires.
Tina M. Nenoff
Page • Tina M. Nenoff Senior Scientist Material, Physical, and Chemical Sciences Tina Nenoff is a senior scientist in the Material, Chemical and Physical Sciences Division at Sandia National Laboratories located in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Recruited from the University of California, Santa Barbara, her career has focused on the materials chemistry of...
Transformational capabilities demonstrated by Sandia at AI Expo
News Article, June 17, 2024 • Danny Gomez from Sandia watches as Senator Martin Heinrich experiences the immersive extended reality environment of JARVIS. (Photo courtesy of John Feddema) Ten national laboratories, including Sandia, shared one of the largest booths at the AI Expo for National Competitiveness from May 7-8 in Washington, D.C. The new conference provided...
Trisonic Wind Tunnel
Page • Technical Characteristics Blowdown to atmosphereM∞= 0.5 - 1.3, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, 3.0Re = 3 - 20 × 106/ftRun times: 20-120 seconds at 20-30 minute intervals12" × 12" test section~1" diameter model size Transonic Test Section Multiple configurations4 porous walls3 porous & 1 solid wall (half-body models)2 porous walls, 2 solid...
U.S. High Arctic Research Center (USHARC)
Facility • Sandia and the University of Alaska Fairbanks have teamed up to advance the concept of a permanent, comprehensive multi-agency USHARC in the Prudhoe Bay area.
Understanding molecular-scale effects on fracture can inform resource extraction and help maintain the nation’s infrastructure
News Article, June 8, 2023 • Three images show liquid nanoindentation setup, the indentation site, and water inside the crack tip in a molecular dynamics simulation. Subcritical fracture controls deformation and permeability of rocks and degradation of manmade materials. To further understand the chemical mechanisms controlling subcritical fracture, this three-year project created nanomechanical and continuum-scale mechanics...
Understanding the effects of radiation on reconfigurable phase change materials
News Article, June 22, 2023 • David Adams was elected Fellow and President of American Vacuum Society: Science and Technology of Materials, Interfaces and Processing in 2023. Chalcogenide thin films that undergo reversible phase changes show promise for next-generation nanophotonics, metasurfaces, and other emerging technologies. This general class of thin films can be switched rapidly between...
Unique Mobility
Page • We specialize in developing advanced mobility technologies to support a broad range of tasks and missions. With expertise in mechanical design and fabrication, video and vision processing, communications systems, embedded computing, control, and navigation, we develop advanced mobility systems that are able to overcome a variety of obstacles and terrains,...
Urban Hopper
Page • As part of an ongoing Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) project, Sandia National Laboratories has developed a small, shoebox-sized, GPS guided, unmanned ground vehicle that can jump over and onto obstacles more than 6 meters high. With an estimated range of 2 kilometers, the robot can drive using motor-driven...
Using machine learning to create rapid stronglink mechanisms
News Article, April 10, 2023 • Computer aided design (CAD) to simulation workflows for nuclear deterrence (ND) have shown dramatic performance improvements with ML. This work targets some of the most inefficient, tedious, and error-prone bottlenecks using new ML-based methods. Common mechanisms such as fasteners and springs can now be quickly identified and reduced to simulation-ready...
Using nonlocal interface problem allows for 7x speedup in large-scale simulations
News Article, May 9, 2023 • Multimaterial problems exist in mission applications such as mechanics and subsurface transport. To capture effects arising from long-range forces at the microscale and mesoscale that aren’t accounted for by classical partial differential equations, the MAThematical foundations for Nonlocal Interface Problems (MATNIP) project team developed a mathematically rigorous interface theory employing...
Using the power of “super-small” to solve large-scale scientific problems
News Article, October 13, 2022 • Sandia builds a testbed for powerful quantum computing hardware and scientific applications. Try this thought experiment: imagine a small measurable quantity of something—perhaps a grain of sand or a point of light—then cut it in half, again and again. When you reach the smallest quantity, such as a photon of...
Results 226–250 of 259