• Improved Nuclear Accident Code Helps Policymakers Assess Risks from Small Reactors

    New software will help the global nuclear industry in assessing the consequences of nuclear accidents. The Maccs code, developed by Sandia researchers, can also evaluate the potential health and environmental risks posed by advanced nuclear reactors and small modular nuclear reactors.

  • Users of Unmanned Aircraft Need to View Risk Mitigation More Holistically

    A recently published study has found that users of unmanned aircraft, also known as drones, need to take a more holistic approach to identifying and mitigating potential risks before undertaking a flight.

  • Chinese “Space Cleaner” Grabbing and Throwing Away Old Satellite

    A Chinese satellite was spotted in late January grabbing another long-dead satellite and days later throwing it into a “graveyard” orbit 300 km away, where objects are less likely to hit spacecraft. There’s nothing wrong with throwing out the trash — many other countries have launched or are currently developing technologies to clear space junk. However, despite the seeming ubiquity of efforts to develop and implement space junk disposal technology, some U.S. officials have expressed worry over Chinese trash disposal satellites.

  • We Need Hydropower for a Resilient Grid

    The shift in power source mix and climate change-driven natural disasters make America’s most critical piece of energy infrastructure—the grid—more vulnerable than ever before. That’s where hydropower plays a pivotal role: When other types of power plants go dark, hydropower provides a fast, crucial response in seconds.

  • Computing Carbon Storage

    The road to a stabilized climate is challenging and contentious. A number of solutions will be needed to enable a fast, equitable transition away from fossil fuels: among them the development of sustainable energy sources, greener materials, and methods to remove CO₂ from the atmosphere.

  • Fog Detection Software Helps Keep Travelers Safe

    Fog and low stratus clouds over airports can create dangerous travel conditions that result in costly delays and disrupted travel plans. A new fog detection software will help.

  • Broad, and Likely Unauthorized, Use of Pegasus Spyware by Israel's Police Shocks Israel

    Since 2015, Israel’s police has employed the intrusive Pegasus spyware to spy on businesspeople, journalists and editors, senior managers of government ministries and agencies, leaders of protest movements, and more – and it appears that in many, if not most, of these cases, the spying was done without judicial approval or after judges were misled by the police about the nature of the monitoring technology. The Pegasus software has been used by authoritarian governments around the world to spy on political opponents, human rights activist, journalists – and in at least one case, to spy on U.S. diplomats. The U.S. has blacklisted the Israeli company NSO, Pegasus maker, and American companies are not allowed to sell their technology to NSO or do business with it

  • Automated Approach to Extract Security Policies from Software

    Researchers are exploring how a new automated approach could prevent software security vulnerabilities. The researchers sought to develop a deep learning model that could teach software how to extract security policies automatically.

  • Improving the Flow of Renewable Energy to Power Plants

    Integrating renewable energy with the power grid continues to be a big challenge for the electrical grid infrastructure in the United States. The solution is not simple, but it is not impossible, either.

  • Refurbishing Nukes: Major Milestone for B61-12 Life Extension Program

    Sandia National Laboratories marked a major milestone in November 2021 when the Nuclear Security Enterprise successfully produced the first completely refurbished bomb for the B61-12 life extension program.

  • Nuclear Energy as a Hidden Gem

    Advanced nuclear reactors will be a key component of a carbon-neutral economy. Andrew Breshears, a principal nuclear chemist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory, offers a back-to-basics look at nuclear energy, and the importance of science communication in the nuclear field.

  • Hydropower and the Future of Energy

    To combat climate change, the United States has set ambitious goals toward a clean energy, carbon-free future. Hydropower — one of humankind’s oldest power sources — will be critical to meeting those goals. Experts discuss the value of hydropower to the future of energy, opportunities and challenges ahead for hydropower and its connection to the future electric grid.

  • When Water Is Coming from All Sides

    When hurricanes hit, it is not solely the storm surge from the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean that led to flooding. Inland sources, like rain-swollen rivers, lakes and suburban culverts, also contributed significantly. Researchers have developed and tested the world’s first 3D operational storm surge model, which takes these factors, which were missed by many computer models at the time, into account.

  • Robot Dogs Soon to Be Deployed at the Border

    DHS ST is offering a helping hand (or “paw”) with new robotic dog technology that can assist with enhancing the capabilities of CBP personnel, while simultaneously increasing their safety downrange.

  • Functionally Graded Material Resistant to Blasts, Fire in buildings

    When a bomb goes off or fire breaks out, a building constructed or retrofitted with an engineered composite currently confined to special applications could buy the surviving occupants extra time to get out. Functionally graded material (FGM), a recently developed composite characterized by the gradual variation of material properties across its thickness, is an effective bomb-resistant material in structural uses.