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The Sandia Programs Engineering and Assembly Research facility, or SPEAR, is the newest facility in nuclear weapons systems engineering at Sandia’s California site, expanding the Labs’ capacity to assemble and electrically test nuclear weapons components and systems.
Sandia’s National Solar Thermal Test Facility will host a number of “firsts” in 2020, including testing a particle-to-supercritical carbon dioxide heat-exchanger system, and the world’s first on-sun falling particle receiver connected to a supercritical CO2 loop.
Lab News sat down for a conversation with Associate Labs Director Andy McIlroy, head of the Integrated Security Solutions Division, as he starts his second year in that role following a year permanently marked by a new reality for Sandia and the nation.
To accommodate Sandia's significant increase in hiring to meet mission needs coupled with the need to ensure workforce safety amid the pandemic, leaders at the Livermore site are taking a multipronged approach, including continued telecommuting, creating flexible “kiosk hubs,” constructing new facilities and temporarily leasing office space near the campus.
The novel approach of Integrated Service Delivery being practiced in several centers within Sandia’s Integrated Security Solutions Division was tested to its utmost this year, as departments had to suddenly figure out how to accommodate a remote workforce and then just as suddenly overcome dozens of challenges to bring people back to work safely on site.
As Sandia and the nation came to terms with a new, socially distanced reality, researchers within the Labs’ Integrated Security Solutions Division were working to understand the biology of the novel coronavirus, learn how the human body responds to infection by SARS CoV-2 and model how COVID-19 spreads in a population.
One of the most consistent voices heard this year during our new reality shaped by the COVID-19 pandemic has been that of Dr. Dan Azar, Sandia’s California site physician.
The Integrated Security Solutions division held a town hall on Aug. 11 for parents who are balancing work and childcare responsibilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. The event covered several topics affecting working parents, including schedule flexibility, the vacation donation program, expanded open enrollment options and support for caregivers.
A team of students from Dougherty Valley High School in San Ramon, California, won the 2020 DOE National Science Bowl in June. The National Science Bowl, a Jeopardy-like competition for U.S. high school and middle school students, tests their knowledge and academic ability in all areas of science and mathematics.