Dutton Named Lab’s Site Construction Coordinator

Dutton

Les Dutton of the Directorate’s Project Management Office has been named Berkeley Lab’s Site Construction Coordinator, a newly created position that will help the Lab smoothly navigate more than $500 million in infrastructure improvements and construction projects over the next six years. Chief among Dutton’s responsibilities is ensuring that the Lab’s daily operations are impacted as little as possible by the upcoming projects, which include construction of the Helios Energy Research Facility and the Computational Research and Theory Facility, demolition of the Bevatron, and several seismic upgrades. Despite these efforts, there will be impacts to traffic, parking, pedestrian walkways, and noise levels as construction material and personnel are transported to various worksites. Employees with questions and concerns can contact Dutton at (510) 499-0195 and [email protected]. Go here for more information.

Brown-Bag Talk
On Nutrition at Lab

Space Rock Impacts
Cooled the Planet

A Columbia University geophysicist believes that space rocks that hit earth thousands of years ago are more numerous than once thought. Such objects can release as much energy as 1,000 nuclear bombs, throwing debris, dust, and gases into the atmosphere, blocking sunlight and temporarily cooling the planet. A team of researchers led by Berkeley Lab earth scientist Richard Firestone recently announced the discovery of evidence that one or two huge space rocks exploded high above Canada 12,900 years ago. The detonation, they believe, caused widespread fires and dust clouds, and disrupted climate patterns so severely that it triggered a prolonged period of global cooling. Full story.

Taking a Step Towards
3-D Invisibility Cloak

Physicists have in recent years made it possible to bend, or refract, light in the opposite direction to any natural materials. These metamaterials make it possible to create invisibility cloaks that hide an object by steering light around it. So far, researchers have created negative refractive-index materials and even an "invisibility cloak" for visible light and microwaves. But they have all been flat, working only in two dimensions. Now Jason Valentine, with Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division, claims to have made a 3-D metamaterial with a negative refractive index. Full story.