Thursday, July 17, 1997
Employees rewarded for safe work practices
Employees in organizations throughout the Laboratory have started safety programs designed to encourage and reward safe work practices.
They range from monetary awards to earning "bucks" to purchase prizes for employees who spot potential safety hazards or implement new procedures or programs to make the workplace safer.
Today through Friday, the Lab is sponsoring Safety Days to raise awareness and remind employees and subcontract personnel of the need to practice safety on the job. During this three-day period, Laboratory Director Sig Hecker has mandated that all Laboratory organizations take the time required, roughly four hours, from one of these days to review safety practices and renew their committment to working in a safe manner (see July 9 Daily Newsbulletin).
The following are some "safety-first actions" for which employees or employee teams were recognized in the past year:
A Systems Support (BUS-7) employee received $500 for his idea to place a mirror in front of the elevator in the Otowi Building. The employee noticed it was difficult to see people walking by the elevator and, therefore, a potential safety hazard, especially if someone is pushing carts of mail or equipment out of the elevator.
Materials Management (BUS-4) started the "Earn Bucks" program to reward employees who recognize and correct safety hazards, or implement new safety procedures. Employees can earn bucks in $10 increments up to $50, for correcting safety hazards. They receive vouchers that can be redeemed for a gift from a selected gift catalog.
Last October, for example, a BUS-4 employee observed a forklift improperly parked. The employee, who was trained to operate a forklift, relocated it in a safe manner.
Another BUS-4 employee noticed a seat belt on a forklift wasn't working properly. The seatbelt was fixed after the employee reported it.
Last February, a BUS-4 employee shoveled snow and ice from sidewalks, a ramp and porch before other employees arrived for work. That same month, an employee was recognized for observing that pieces of wood in a pile contained nails, which was creating a potential safety hazard. Those pieces of wood were removed from the pile.
In April, another BUS employee was recognized for "saving" another employee from a forklift driver who was backing up and apparently didn't see the employee.
Some employees at a Procurement (BUS-5) worksite moved a microwave oven from on top of a refrigerator, because it was difficult for some employees to reach -- the microwave was moved to a table that was easier to access.
Other safety successes include a Los Alamos Achievement Award for a team of employees and subcontract personnel from various organizations Labwide who developed an electrical safety program.
An employee in Materials Technology: Coatings and Polymers (MST-7) was recognized for identifying safety concerns at an off-site workplace. The employee refused to work at the worksite until the safety issues were resolved.
The Engineering Sciences and Applications (ESA) Division dedicated one-third of its Los Alamos Awards Program funds to recognize employees who identify work hazards or develop and implement new safety programs and processes. Safety successes are published in ESA's monthly employee newsletter.
At a Nonproliferation and International Security (NIS) Division workplace, work was stopped when employees noticed that appropriate safety reviews for a proposed exercise hadn't been performed.
Another NIS employee was recognized for reporting possible safety hazards by a contractor. An investigation later determined that the contractor was trying to deviate from Occupational Safety and Health Administration and crane safety requirements.
Another NIS employee received $500 for removing potentially unsafe chemicals from a worksite. The employee's actions helped clean up the site and reduce NIS program space charges.
Several teams in Advanced Nuclear Technology (NIS-6) also received monetary awards for developing and implementing a criticality facility diversified training program involving the Lab and several federal government agencies.
Two Human Resources (HR) Division employees received certificates of recognition for serving on HR's Safety Committee and fostering a safe work environment in HR offices.
An employee in Quality, Strategy and Resource Planning (FSS-1) was recognized for noticing that a co-worker used a rolling chair to reach a ceiling light. The employee stopped the co-worker, averting a potential accident.
A Computer and Communication Security (FSS-14) employee identified and corrected an unsafe act in using a ladder.
Another FSS-1 employee was recognized after finding a raccoon on a co-worker's desk. The employee closed the door and evacuated the building until the raccoon was trapped and removed.
--Steve Sandoval
Laboratory technology used to treat skin diseases
An electronic instrument that will help physicians treat a range
of disfiguring skin diseases soon will be available worldwide. The instrument
can be used to treat numerous benign skin conditions and certain tumors.
And it offers a long-awaited cure for 12 million people in 88 countries
who suffer from an endemic tropical disease that causes persistent skin
lesions.
The device, carried down the long road from lab bench to doctor's office by a small Arizona company called Thermosurgery Technologies Inc., is based on technology developed decades ago by the Laboratory.
"I am pleased to see technology we transferred so long ago now doing wonderful things we did not even imagine," said James Doss, an engineer in RF Technology (LANSCE-5).
The radio frequency device delivers precisely controlled, localized heat to a small area of tissue. Malignant cells are typically more sensitive to slightly elevated temperatures. Application of heat close to the range of a very high fever destroys malignant cells, but allows healthy surrounding cells to regenerate. The technology provides an effective way to apply heat only to diseased tissues and precisely control the temperature in the treated areas.
Los Alamos researchers patented a technique for radio frequency heating of tumor tissue in 1977. Doss created computer software that modeled electric and thermal fields in tissue. With his colleagues Bill McCabe, Tom Boyd and Joe Albillar, Doss designed electrodes to deliver the radio frequency current. The team collaborated with several veterinary and medical schools for research on applications of the localized current fields for general cancer therapy. In the process, they treated tumors in a variety of animals, including cats, dogs and even a zoo elephant.
The animal research led to the first commercial application of the Los Alamos technology in the late 1970s -- a veterinary treatment of tumors of the eye and eyelid in cattle. Cancer-eye is a common disease of cattle, especially the Hereford breed, that sharply reduces the commercial value of the animals. A battery-operated field unit with dual electrodes became a viable tool for veterinarians and ranchers.
One entrepreneur who manufactured the device for cancer-eye treatment was Gene Hedin. But Hedin recognized the broader potential of the technology. Now, after 15 years of clinical trials, venture capital appeals, collaborations with the Laboratory and product development, Hedin's company, Thermosurgery Technologies Inc., is introducing the refined technology to the medical market.
The ThermoTech instrument directs a radio frequency current to a dual-electrode tip. A physician places the electrodes in contact with the tissue. Due to resistance to current flow, the tissue between the probes is heated. The technology does not simply transfer heat from the instrument, but generates heat within the tissue itself.
The effective temperature for treatment, called hyperthermia, does not burn the tissue. Treatment is effective at about 111 degrees Fahrenheit (44 degrees Celsius).
One of the electrodes contains a thermocouple device that continuously monitors the temperature of the treatment site and controls the electrical circuitry that generates the radio frequency field. Many conditions can be treated with a single application of 30 to 60 seconds. Compared to traditional treatments, skin heals rapidly, with reduced recurrence and diminished side effects and scarring.
Hedin financed a research contract with the Laboratory for technical assistance. Doss provided ThermoTech with computer models to estimate the distribution of temperatures in tissues under treatment. And the Lab team also designed electrodes for specific applications.
"The development of our product would not have been possible without the support and help of Doss and his team and our contract with Los Alamos," Hedin said.
ThermoTech will initially market one instrument model with eight exchangeable tips for treating various skin conditions. According to the company, the FDA has issued market release approvals for treatment of 16 benign diseases. Hedin said patients will begin seeing the device in doctors' offices within the year.
But the most potent impact of the ThermoTech instrument on world health at this time will be the easy and effective treatment of a tropical skin disease called cutaneous leishmaniasis.
Leishmaniasis is caused by a microscopic protozoan parasite transmitted by the bite of a small blood-feeding sand fly. Untreated leishmanial skin lesions, from small papules to large disfiguring ulcers, last nine months or more, with some lesions persisting for years.
Major outbreaks of leishmaniasis occur in Africa, the Arab countries, India, Mexico and Central and South America. Based on estimates by experts in tropical diseases, more than 12 million people suffer from the disease.
Antibiotics generally prescribed against bacterial infections are useless against leishmaniasis. Drugs currently used to combat the disease are toxic, slow acting, expensive and often not available in many countries.
Now, however, doctors treating leishmaniasis victims with the localized current field instrument in southern Mexico report a 95 percent cure-rate, despite the rugged field conditions. A few instruments are also in use in Peru.
According to Bryce Walton, parasitic disease specialist and former secretary of the steering committee on leishmaniasis for the World Health Organization, the Pan American Health Organization -- regional office of WHO for the Americas -- has adopted the device as the treatment of choice for leishmaniasis.
"I spent years looking for an alternate treatment for cutaneous leishmaniasis -- and this is it," said Walton.
The localized current field technology born at Los Alamos is seen as an attractive alternative treatment for many skin diseases traditionally requiring laser or conventional surgery, freezing, radiation therapy or drugs. The commercial product is compact, portable, and rugged.
--Gary Kliewer
CIC director search committee to hold three meetings
The committee of employees formed to make a recommendation on who should become the next director of the Laboratory's Computing, Information and Communications (CIC) Division is holding three meetings to accept comments on qualifications members of the Lab community would like to see in the new division director.
The committee is soliciting stakeholder and customer input particularly from the weapons, basic and applied research, human resources and business communities from within the Laboratory, according to Warren "Pete" Miller, the Lab's acting deputy director for science and technology and chairperson of the search committee.
The town meetings are 2 to 3:30 p.m. July 23 in the Physics Building Auditorium at Technical Area 3; 3 to 4:30 p.m. July 25 in the Otowi Building Cafeteria, also at TA-3; and 9 to 10:30 a.m. July 29 in the Laboratory Data Communications Center (LDCC) Forum, also at TA-3.
Miller said he hopes to make a recommendation to Laboratory Director Sig Hecker by Aug. 31.
The committee includes six CIC employees: Chris Kemper of Network Engineering (CIC-5), Richard Luce of the Research Library (CIC-14), Robin Morel of Computer Research and Applications (CIC-3), Manuel Vigil of Computing (CIC-7), Sally Wilkins of Software Design and Development (CIC-12) and Karl-Heinz Winkler of the CIC Division Office.
Other members of the search committee are John Cerruti of Hydrodynamic Methods (X-HM), Gerald Garvey of Subatomic Physics (P-25), Charles "Chick" Keller of the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (EES-IGPP), Don McCoy of the Nuclear Weapons Technology (NWT) Program Office and Dan Strottman of the Theoretical (T) Division Office.
Miller said the search committee is conducting a national search to find a replacement for Hassan Dayem, who resigned in April to take a position with a pharmaceutical company on the east coast.
An electronic mail address has been established for interested employees to write to the committee to provide input and suggest names of individuals to replace Dayem. The address is cicsearch@lanl.gov.
The CIC Division includes about 1,000 employees and subcontract personnel.
--Steve Sandoval
Hans Mark lists accomplishments of reconnaissance program
International arms control agreements would not have
been possible without the U.S. satellite reconnaissance program, according
to the man who headed the National Reconnaissance Office when even its name
was classified.
Hans Mark, who presented a colloquium titled "Reconnaissance Satellites" at the Physics Building Auditorium Tuesday, listed several significant accomplishments of the reconnaissance program that began in the mid-1950s.
"The most important single achievement," he said, is that "no arms control agreement would have been possible without ... satellite reconnaissance."
The program also has been valuable in helping evaluate the technical capabilities of potential adversaries and supporting U.S. military operations, he said. It also has produced important information related to environmental monitoring and archaeological sites.
Mark, currently a professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering at the University of Texas at Austin, reviewed the history of aerial reconnaissance, showed numerous reconnaissance photos from the 1950s and 1960s, and recounted several anecdotes during his talk.
One story involved the so-called "Caspian Sea Monster," a 12-engine airplane built by the Soviet Union. The plane's purpose and capabilities were "the intelligence problem of the mid-1970s," Mark said.
The NRO took pictures of the plane, which the Soviets were testing in the area of the Caspian Sea, and used the photos to build a model that could be tested in a wind tunnel. The tests showed that the plane did not work very well.
Mark said he was not sure why the Soviet Union built and tested the plane, but he guesses that the military officer in charge of its development had such good political connections that no one could stop the project.
The main point of the incident, he added, was that "we had a good enough system to actually build wind tunnel models to establish the aerodynamic characteristics of the aircraft." The public job title for the director of the NRO was undersecretary of the Air Force, which Mark described as "a cover title" for one of only two civilians with a top operational role in the Pentagon. The other was the secretary of defense.
Mark, who also has been secretary of the Air Force, chancellor of the University of Texas system, deputy administrator of NASA and leader of the Experimental Division at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, headed the NRO for nearly four years beginning in 1977.
"It was one of the most exciting and interesting things I've ever done," he said. "It shows that when this country decides to do something, it can do it right."
The NRO was established in August 1960 with the charter to conceive, develop, build and operate reconnaissance satellites. Its existence, even its name, remained classified until November 1995. At that time, selected elements of early programs were also declassified.
Mark said there were two reasons for the secrecy. An obvious one, he said, was that the country did not want the Soviet Union or other possible adversaries to know its capabilities in the field.
Another, possibly more important, reason emerged during diplomatic discussions with the Soviet Union. Mark said the Soviet Union indicated it would not protest satellite overflights by the United States as long as they were kept secret.
"They did not want to be embarrassed," he said.
Asked during a question-and-answer period after the talk about Soviet capabilities in reconnaissance satellites, Mark said the Soviet Union was far behind the United States.
However, he said, that wasn't because the Soviets were not capable, it was because they didn't have to. The openness of U.S. society allowed Soviet intelligence to obtain information without the need for satellites, while the United States had to rely on satellite reconnaissance.
--John A. Webster
Judge encourages Lab and RIFees to negotiate a settlement
Twenty years could pass before the courts resolve claims that the Laboratory improperly terminated 102 workers during the November 1995 reduction in force, First Judicial District Court Judge Jim Hall said Wednesday.
"We really are talking years and years just to make a dent in the 102 who are claimants," Judge Hall told lawyers during a scheduling hearing in Santa Fe. "At least 20 years."
At issue was whether Judge Hall should set trial dates for any of the remaining plaintiffs in the reduction in force lawsuit.
After a month-long trial, an Albuquerque jury on April 1 decided that the Lab had acted properly in terminating former employees Michael Ares, Evelyn Jacquez, Jerry Leyba and Manuel Trujillo, four of the five RIF cases tried. The jury also found the Lab had breached its covenant of good faith and fair dealing with a fifth employee, Henry Atwater, formerly of the Nonproliferation and International Security (NIS) Division, and awarded Atwater $481,511 in damages.
The Lab and the former employees have appealed both verdicts. Lab lawyer Scott Gordon and plaintiffs' attorney Morton Simon told Judge Hall on Wednesday that the appeals court won't hear the cases for a minimum of 12 to 18 months.
On Wednesday, Judge Hall agreed to delay until mid-October any selection of additional RIFees for future trials or setting of potential trial dates. Gordon and Simon said they don't want the judge to set future trial dates until the appeals court rules.
Gordon said the Laboratory will ask Judge Hall to throw out some of the claims of the remaining 97 plaintiffs that are identical with claims rejected by the jury in the first trial. He said such a ruling should be a priority for the court, as it could resolve certain universal issues and possibly reduce the number of trial issues.
But Simon disagreed. He told Judge Hall, "I don't think any other plaintiff will be bound by any decision of this jury."
The next court date for the former employees will be July 22, when Judge Hall will hear Simon's request that the Lab not be allowed to take sworn depositions from two of the RIFees. The Laboratory claims their testimony relates to its motion to exclude issues ruled on by the first jury.
"I think we need it (the depositions) in order to move these cases toward resolution," Gordon told the judge.
Judge Hall said he would set a hearing for mid-October on the Laboratory's motion to preclude the common issues from future RIF cases.
Simon also told the judge it would be premature to bring other cases to trial until the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs rules on bias claims by 52 of the RIFees. Simon said he's had several meetings with OFCCP officials, who have told him the agency will decide in September whether to bring a formal complaint against the Laboratory for discrimination on the basis of the ethnic origins of 52 Hispanic RIFees.
Although the Department of Labor likely wouldn't rule on the case until late 1998, the agency could order the Lab to rehire the 52 RIFees and award them back pay, Simon said.
But Judge Hall told Simon that whatever relief the Department of Labor gives to the RIFees probably won't resolve all the plaintiffs' state District Court claims, so further trials still would be required.
Hall again encouraged the Laboratory and the RIFees to continue to negotiate a settlement.
Gordon said the Laboratory is willing to settle individuals cases that deserve to be settled. But settling with all 97 remaining plaintiffs is unlikely, Gordon added.
Simon, however, said the RIFees always have sought a "global settlement" of all claims by all 102 plaintiffs and will continue to do so.
Simon also said the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has pending cases filed by 16 of the RIFees who claim the Laboratory discriminated on the basis of age when it laid them off in 1995.
--Jim Danneskiold
Videoconferencing: An alternative to consider
The University of New Mexico, Los Alamos, recently opened the doors of its new Videoconferencing and Video Production Center, joining Customer Service (CIC-6) as a provider of state-of-the art facilities for video teleconferencing. In a Guest Editorial, John P. Tapia of Business Operations (BUS) Division talks about the growing importance of videoconferencing in communications and the facilities available to Lab employees. go to
DOE safety presentation on LABNET
A 27 minute videotape of a presentation on safety by Department of Energy Secretary Federico Peña will be shown at 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. Friday on LABNET Channel 10.
Martha Krebs, director of DOE's Office of Energy Research, also gave the safety presentation at Brookhaven National Laboratory.
The DOE issued a draft action plan last month to address environmental, safety and health issues at Brookhaven National Laboratory and community concerns about the laboratory, which is located in New York. The department in May terminated its contract with Associated Universities to manage Brookhaven following a review of lab operations.
Accident prompts change in weightlifting protocol
A Laboratory employee from Inorganic Trace Analysis (CST-9) was back at work Wednesday, a day after he was hospitalized when a barbell with 375 pounds accidentally fell on him during a workout at the Wellness Center.
The employee was working out at about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday when the incident occurred, said Dr. Hugh Smith of Occupational Medicine (ESH-2). The employee was lying on his back on a bench press machine and had successfully lifted the weight several times. The employee was being "spotted," by another person, Smith said. But when the accident occurred, that person wasn't able to control the weight, which caused it to fall on the employee's chest, Smith explained.
The employee, who regularly works out at the Wellness Center, was transported by ambulance to Los Alamos Medical Center where he was treated and released.
"He's doing great. He's back at work and is having no difficulty as a result of the injury," said Smith.
"We were concerned when it first happened. They did all the necessary studies that determined there were no internal injuries."
The incident has prompted a change in weightlifting protocol at the Wellness Center, Smith added. Two spotters now will be required to "spot" for another employee when working out with heavy weights, he said.
--Steve Sandoval
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