U.S. Department of Energy » Directory

Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) is one of ten national laboratories overseen and primarily funded by the US Department of Energy. Brookhaven is operated and managed by Brookhaven Science Associates, which was founded by the Research Foundation for the State University of New York on behalf of Stony Brook University and Battelle, a nonprofit applied science and technology organization.

The scientists and engineers at BNL work in the following research areas:

• Climate, Environment, & Biosciences
• Energy Security
• Photon Sciences
• QCD Matter
• Physics of the Universe

Brookhaven operates cutting-edge large-scale facilities for studies in physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, applied science, and a wide range of advanced technologies. These facilities include:

• Center for Functional Nanomaterials
• Radiotracer Chemistry, Instrumentation and Biological Imaging
• Brookhaven Linac Isoptope Producer
• Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider
• National Synchrotron Light Source II
• Computational Science Center
• Accelerator Test Facility
• NASA Space Radiation Laboratory
• Long Island Solar Farm
• Tandem Van de Graaff Facility

The Laboratory’s almost 3,000 scientists, engineers, and support staff are joined each year by more than 4,000 visiting researchers from around the world. BNL coordinates with a wide range of federal and local institutions, including the Northeast Biodefense Center.

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is a premier national security research institution, delivering scientific and engineering solutions to ensure the safety, security, and reliability of the U.S. nuclear deterrent; reduce global threats; and solve other emerging national security and energy challenges.

LANL is the design agency for the W76/W88 Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile warheads, the W78 Intercontinental Ballistic Missile warhead, and the B61 gravity bomb. These four systems constitute 80 percent of the U.S. on-alert nuclear deterrent.

Work in biothreat reduction at Los Alamos extends across many areas including detection technologies, bioforensics, pathogen analysis, and understanding host-pathogen interactions for better vaccine development.

Los Alamos has approximately 10,000 employees and a FY 2014 budget of $2.1 billion.

Los Alamos is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC (LANS) under contract to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) as part of the U.S. Department of Energy. LANS comprises four U.S. organizations that partner to support delivery of our national security science mission. These entities are the University of California; Bechtel National, Inc.; The Babcock and Wilcox Company; and URS Corporation.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is the largest U.S. Department of Energy science and energy laboratory, conducting basic and applied research to deliver transformative solutions to compelling problems in energy and security.

ORNL is operated by UT-Battelle LLC, supporting DOE’s national missions of scientific discovery, clean energy, and security. The Laboratory employs more than 4,400 including scientists and engineers in more than 100 disciplines, with an operating budget of approximately $1.4 billion.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory was established in 1943 to carry out a critical assignment for the Manhattan Project: demonstrating the production and separation of plutonium to fuel an atomic weapon. Following the war, ORNL took on a new assignment: the development of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. The facilities and expertise assembled for the Manhattan Project expanded to support a nuclear research and development portfolio that extended from basic science to applied technology.

Researchers at ORNL work with federal, state, and local agencies to develop and deploy technologies to improve the ability to detect, prevent, respond to, and recover from acts of terrorism as well as natural disasters. In addition to nuclear detection technologies, the lab is providing new ways to identify small quantities of explosives, hazardous chemicals, and biological materials. ORNL also develops systems for threat assessment, risk awareness, and emergency planning and response, as well as new capabilities for first responders.

Sandia National Laboratories is a Federally-Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) operated and managed by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation. Sandia Corporation operates Sandia National Laboratories as a contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).

Although most of Sandia’s approximately 10,000 employees work at Sandia’s headquarters in Albuquerque, New Mexico, or at its second principal laboratory in Livermore, California, others are working at various sites in the U.S. and abroad.

Sandia is responsible for all non-nuclear components of the nuclear explosive package to create a militarily effective and logistically sustainable U.S. nuclear deterrent. Sandia’s nuclear weapons mission is focused on three imperatives:

• Maintain the U.S. stockpile through surveillance and the exchange of weapon components that have limited life
• Sustain the stockpile into the future through Life Extension Programs and Alterations
• Maintain and advance Sandia’s required engineering and science capabilities, operations and infrastructure to ensure the health and vitality of Sandia’s nuclear weapons mission.

Sandia evaluates the reliability and safety of every active stockpile weapon type on an annual basis, and documents its findings in a letter from the laboratory director to the Energy and Defense Secretaries.

In terms of nuclear nonproliferation and arms control, Sandia plays a critical role in the development of national space and ground systems to monitor nuclear explosions, pioneered the systematic analysis and design of physical protection systems for both civilian and military nuclear facilities, developed the concept of portal perimeter monitoring for arms control and enabled international partners to secure nuclear materials around the world.

Sandia also maintains the Chemical Security Program (CSP), which supports a variety of activities to promote chemical security in partner countries, including: chemical safety and security trainings for academic and industry  audiences, Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)-led chemical security workshops for government and industry representatives, trainings to strengthen academic chemical societies, the development of a chemical security toolkit, architectural design support for chemistry lab construction, agrichemical security initiatives, and grants for training and physical security upgrades at academic and industrial facilities with dangerous chemicals.