Chief Science Officer Tom Bowles highlighted scientific accomplishments and identified areas for improvement in his State of Science talk Monday in the Administration Building Auditorium.
"The best part of my job is going around to different groups and learning about new things that are going on at the Lab," Bowles said to employees in the auditorium and watchers on LABNET.
Bowles began by recognizing staff for their recent accomplishments and awards including four Lab employees named American Physical Society Fellows for 2004. Additionally, Quanxi Jia, a Laboratory Fellow and Device Team Leader in the Superconductivity Technology Center of the Materials Science and Technology (MST) Division, was named as the Asian American Engineer of the Year for 2005.
Bowles also profiled the recent Lab projects that won R&D awards. These included a 10-Gigabit Ethernet Adapter, which has applications in wider industrial environments; Clustermatic, a complete cluster management software solution; Confocal X-ray florescence, originally developed to identify elements in radioactive waste and now used in determining art forgeries; Plasma Torch Production of Spherical Boron Nitride Particles; and mpiBlast, a high speed software catalyst for genetic research used in combating bio-terrorism.
"None of this could have been done without tremendous help in preparing the nominations by the support side of the Lab," said Bowles.
In addition, he recognized Richard Hughes of Neutron Science and Technology (P-23) and Jane Nordholt of Biological and Quantum Physics (P-21) for earning the Descartes Prize for Research, one of the highest awards given in Europe, for their work on Quantum Key Distribution.
Bowles also noted that Lab employees Bette Korber of Theoretical Biology and Biophysics (T-10) , Fred Mortensen of Thermonuclear Applications (X-2) and Greg Swift of Condensed Matter and Thermal Physics (MST-10) received three out of seven E.O. Lawrence Awards from the Department of Energy.
The Research Library (STB-RL) also was mentioned as a "highlight of the year" as it was rated "best science digital library in the world" by an external advisory board. Bowles credited Rick Luce for his role as the Library's director and encouraged staff to utilize the Library's resources as they "could really help your life."
Bowles also presented several Lab research highlights. Such highlights included solar research at Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, the search for new state of matter (PHENIX), solar and astrophysical plasmas, instruments on the Odyssey Orbiter to study the surface water distribution on Mars and atmospheric activities monitoring.
He also mentioned the study of nonlinear, nonequilibrium dynamics of materials, the Chemistry ( C ) Division's work on the Quantum-Dot program and research dealing with magnetic-field-induced-quantum-coherent spin state in an ancient purple pigment. He profiled H igh Explosives Science and Technology's (DX-2) work with low density metal foams, Los Alamos Neutron Science Center's (LANSCE) new diamond-like phase formed by carbon nanotubes and the DOE's (through the Lab) contribution to sequencing the human genome.
Much focus was also placed on computing efforts, including the institutional computing project creating the turquoise network - a new, open collaborative network. Computer modeling of large-scale extragalactic structures and 3-D simulations of the asteroid impact that supposedly killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago and are still relevant for tsunami research were mentioned. Bowles also cited the Lab's collaborative effort with Sandia to predict the course of Hurricane Francis, thus, acting as a resource for Florida power companies and authorities.
Bowles profiled several additional research highlights for 2004 - he plans on posting his full presentation online for viewing by Lab staff.
Additionally, he stressed the importance of collaboration with the University of California (as it acts as a pipeline into the Lab for students) and listed the number of joint Lab / UC publications - there are more than 1,000 in the physics category alone. He also said the Lujan Center at LANSCE, where students can come to study, is another good example of this collaboration.
As Chief Science Officer, Bowles maintained that his role is two-fold: 1) work to ensure the health of science at the Lab by providing a strong communication link between staff and management, and 2) oversee the quality of science at the Lab. He also serves as the point of contact with universities and science sponsors. Bowles is supported in his efforts by Deputy Chief Science Officer David Sharp and the Science Council.
Addressing issues in science
In striving for the Lab's main science goal to sustain a healthy and viable science effort that will be able to address the long-term needs of the nation, Bowles identified a few issues. "We need to get real at defining our priorities," he said. Adding, "we need to integrate our capabilities across the Lab much more effectively." Getting the necessary resources, obtaining buy-in from sponsors, developing a plan and tracking it to completion are all part of the science roadmap that will be constructed over the next year with the help of technical directorates.
"Right now, we are using strategic technical goals as guidance," Bowles said adding the he hopes to have the more defined, integrated roadmap where resources are shared across the Lab in place by the end of the year.
Bowles also listed safety and security at Los Alamos as a top priority mentioning that the Lab is the worst defense programs lab for Price-Anderson and Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board violations. Citing last year's safety infractions, he said, "It is only by the grace of God we didn't kill some people. It is essential that the Lab is fully safe, secure and complaint."
However, Bowles said compliant doesn't mean unquestioning. "Compliant means we should ensure safety, security, and the ability to do our mission. But, you need to push back on things that do not make sense," said Bowles.
The plan also calls for supporting emerging science. Bowles said, "Exploratory, small scale science is a the heart of this Laboratory. If we don't get this right, it will impact the future of the Lab."
He stated that Lab Director Pete Nanos has designated $25 million this fiscal year to support small-scale science efforts in bioscience, defense transformation, energy security, the future of LANSCE, global nuclear futures and microfabrication of quantum devices.
Bowles and his team also are changing the way LDRD reviews are conducted to make an open process based on scientific excellence with full disclosure of the status of proposals.
The Lab also has started to initiate weapons supporting research to provide program-directed research and development in areas that are "important to meet the long-term, future needs of the weapons program."
Additionally, the Chief Science Office is working with Associate Director for Administration (ADA) Rich Marquez, who is developing a business model for science that enables science through strategic reinvestment of overhead resources back into programs with the goal of reducing the cost of doing business. As costs are not fully controlled at the Executive Board level, Bowles cautioned that one problem with this strategy is things are being added at the group level that are not required. To try to alleviate this problem, all new Lab policies, procedures and requirements will be vetted by the Chief Science Officer.
"[The Laboratory] can be fully safe, secure, and compliant and still maintain world-class science," he said. Bowles pointed out that it is to a large extent up to [Lab employees] to ensure that we do that.
"The quality of staff and of science and engineering at Los Alamos is still the highest level, but we still have a tremendous amount of work to do," said Bowles.
"We are absolutely committed to achieving success."
--Hildi Kelsey