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Julia Phillips, director of Nuclear Weapons Science and Technology Programs at Sandia National Laboratories, and Sandia researcher Neville Moody have been named Fellows in the Materials Research Society.

Space satellites that detect nuclear events and environmental gasses face a data logjam because their increasingly powerful sensors produce more information than their bandwidth can easily transmit. Sandia National Laboratories experiments at the International Space Station indicate that sending more complex computer chips into space to pre‑reduce the large data stream sent Earthbound could be the answer. But how well would the latest, most sensitive computing electronics fare in the harsh environment of outer space?

Biofuel combustion chemistry more complex than petroleum-based fuels, say Sandia and Lawrence Livermore researchers.

A Los Alamos National Laboratory toxicologist and a multidisciplinary team of researchers have documented potential cellular damage from "fullerenes" -- soccer-ball-shaped, cage-like molecules composed of 60 carbon atoms. The team also noted that this particular type of damage might hold hope for treatment of Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease or even cancer.

Self-repairing materials within nuclear reactors may one day become a reality as a result of research by Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists. In a paper appearing today in the journal Science, Los Alamos researchers report a surprising mechanism that allows nanocrystalline materials to heal themselves after suffering radiation-induced damage.

Two teams of researchers -- including Los Alamos National Laboratory theoretical biologists Bette Korber, Will Fischer, Sydeaka Watson, and James Szinger -- have announced an HIV vaccination strategy that has been shown to expand the breadth and depth of immune responses in rhesus monkeys. Rhesus monkeys provide the best animal model currently available for testing HIV vaccines.

Solid-state lighting and its potential as a near-term generator of energy efficiencies will be the topic of a presentation by Julia Phillips, director of the Physical, Chemical, and Nano Sciences Center at Sandia National Laboratories, at the 2010 AAAS annual meeting.