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Sandia, University Of Montana Researchers Try Training Bees To Find Buried Landmines

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Bees dutifully going about their daily business -- gathering nectar and pollen and taking it back to the hive -- may one day help protect the lives and limbs of people, literally, if a landmine-detection demonstration at Sandia National Laboratories is successful. Foraging bees may reliably and inexpensively detect buried mines and safely return hundreds of thousands of acres of uncharted land back to productive use.

Funder: Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

Sandia Discovery About Protein May Help Clean Up Pollutants, Find Cures For Diseases

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A discovery linking the shape of a unit called the heme in a protein to protein function may prove useful in a range of scientific advances, including finding cures for diseases and cleaning up pollutants, says discoverer John Shelnutt, a physicist at the Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories.

Research Partners 'Demystify' Ceramics Manufacturing

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories, five commercial ceramic manufacturers, and Los Alamos National Laboratory are making ceramic history by taking the "art" out of ceramics production and replacing it with science, resulting in better products and lower production costs. It is the first time that competing ceramic companies and national laboratories have joined forces for research and development.

Sandia's Tiny Acoustic Wave Sensors Will Detect Minute Traces Of Dangerous Chemicals

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Minute acoustic wave chemical sensors being developed at the U.S. Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories will in the next two years be part of a hand-held chemical detection system, commonly called "chem lab on a chip," and other integrated microsensor systems. The microsensors are each about the size of a grain of rice.

Funder: US Department of Energy

Some, Like Russian Dolls, Fit Inside Each Other: Self-Assembled Nanospheres May Be Helpful Against Disease Or Terrorism, Or As Fillers And Coatings

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Self-assembling nanospheres that fit inside each other like Russian dolls are one form of a broad range of nanospheres created in the past 12 months at Sandia National Laboratories. The achievements, which have medical, industrial and military potential, demonstrate unprecedented control over organic and inorganic nanoscale self-assemblies and represent a major step forward in control of these techniques.

Journal: Nature
Funder: National Science Foundation, US Department of Energy

Device To Safely Examine Insides Of Package Bombs

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Sandia has developed a technique to determine if stray packages contain bombs. This means police will not have to routinely evacuate an area and blow up ownerless packages. A remotely controlled, motorized cart will roll an X-ray device to the scene. A picture formed from reflected X-rays will be transmitted to the distant operator.

Funder: Department of Energy; Sandia's Laboratory Directed Research and Development Program

Sandia Decontamination Foam May Be Tomorrow's Best First Response In A Chem-Bio Attack

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories have created a foam that begins neutralizing both chemical and biological agents in minutes. Because it is not harmful to people, it could be dispensed on the disaster scene immediately, even before casualties are evacuated. Its developers think the decontaminating foam soon may be the best first response available in the event of a chem-bio attack.

Funder: Department of Energy

Protein Adultery Revealed!: Mechanism Of Protein Folding Captured In Computer Simulation

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Protein misfolding is a cause of Alzheimer's,"mad cow" disease, and could figure in biowarfare. Now the first robust computer model of one protein interfering with the folding of another has been created at Sandia. The model provides insights into the mechanisms by which incomplete folds occur, in order to prevent them, and is a first step in successful protein engineering.

Journal: Journal of Computational Biology
Funder: Department of Energy

Robocasting: Sandia Develops New Way To Fabricate Ceramics

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

An engineer at Sandia National Laboratories has developed a new way to fabricate ceramics that requires no molds or machining. Called robocasting, it relies on robotics for computer-controlled deposition of ceramic slurries — mixtures of ceramic powder, water, and trace amounts of chemical modifers — through a syringe.

Architecture Program Aims To Make Buildings More Resistant To Terrorism And Catastrophes

DOE/Sandia National Laboratories
Peer-Reviewed Publication

When disaster strikes, people evacuate. That’s because the structures that normally protect us — buildings, bridges, dams, and tunnels — are often the most dangerous places to be during catastrophes like hurricanes, earthquakes, industrial accidents, or terrorist attacks. Rudy Matalucci, a civil engineer at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M., wants people to feel compelled to run into buildings rather than out of them during emergencies.

Funder: US Department of Energy