PLS wraps up summer student programs
Approximately 1000 students came to the Laboratory this summer to engage in work-study employment in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and administrative fields. PLS hosted a number of these students through its summer student programs (described below).
Nuclear science and security
The Glenn T. Seaborg Institute hosted 12 students this summer, including 8 students supported by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA). For eight weeks, students researched topics such as portable radiation detectors, uranium plasma chemistry, and application of neural networks to nuclear theory. On August 7, DTRA program managers visited with the students to discuss career and research opportunities at the agency.
Chemistry and materials science
MSD hosted 58 students through the Materials and Chemistry Institute (MaCI) Summer Program (45 students) and the Computational Chemistry and Materials Science (CCMS) Summer Institute (13 students). The Science Undergraduate Laboratory Internships, Military Academic Research Associates, and diversity programs supported several students in the MaCI program. Students gained experience in materials synthesis, materials characterization, materials processing, analytical chemistry, actinide materials science, optical materials science, electrochemistry, materials chemistry, physics, and computational science. Both institutes held seminars throughout the summer, which featured scientists discussing their research and career paths. On July 2, Glenn Fox, Anantha Krishnan, and Pat Falcone attended a brown bag lunch with MaCI students.
High-energy-density science
The High-Energy-Density Science Center (HEDS Center), the Inertial Confinement Fusion Program, and the Joint High Energy Density Science and Technology Division coordinated a HED summer student program, hosting 33 total students, with 10 supported directly by the HEDS Center. Student research areas included astrophysics, hydrodynamics, turbulence, plasma physics, internal confinement physics, and radiation/particle transport. Students attended weekly meetings to practice their presentation skills and learn about each other’s research. The program hosted a poster symposium on August 9 for students to present their research and network with other HED scientists.
Student poster symposium
For many students, the capstone of their summer was a poster symposium, where they had a chance to showcase their summer research projects and communicate their work with others. PLS was well represented at this year’s symposium, and 11 participating students received recognition awards:
- Andrew Brown (MaCI)
- Michelle Coyle (MaCI)
- Catherine Crichton (MaCI)
- Katie Harding (Livermore Scholar)
- Matthew Holcomb (CCMS)
- Connor Krill (HEDS)
- Ian Phillips (MaCI)
- Felicia Sutanto (Livermore Scholar)
- Michael Wadas (HEDS)
- Anna Wang (BBTD)
- Meng Zhang (AEED)
At the awards ceremony, held on August 8, the top winner from each organization gave a three-minute presentation on their poster. Poster evaluators selected Michael Wadas to present his poster titled “Enhancing dynamic compression experiments with target density gradients.”