September
20, 2002
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September
20, 2002 |
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September 11 Remembered
September 11 RememberedAbout 150 employees gathered solemnly at the flag pavilion on Cyclotron Road last Wednesday to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the September 11 tragedy. Deputy Director Sally Benson addressed the crowd (see right), while Laboratory fire fighters, along with the Alameda County Fire Department Honor Guard, led the ceremony as flags were lowered to half staff. Speakers also included Dick Nolan of the DOE Berkeley site office. A minute of silence was observed earlier in the day.
Remarks by Sally BensonOne year ago today our world changed. Thousands of people were killed in a senseless act of violence still hard to comprehend. Over the past year, each one of us has surely struggled with how to deal with the events of that day. What they mean about our past, our present and the future. And what they mean to the families, friends, and colleagues of those who lost someone special in their lives. Unlike almost any other day, this day is one that I am sure you will always remember: where you were the moment you heard about this terrible tragedy; who you spoke to; what you were thinking about at the time. I first learned about this tragedy from my niece, who witnessed it a mile from the World Trade Center. I was concerned for her safety and that of my husband, who was in Washington, D.C. at the time the third plane hit the Pentagon.
Each of us has our own personal stories about this day, the day that was unimaginable until Sept. 11, 2001. In the years and decades that unfold we will look back to this day as a turning point in our history. My sincerest hope is that neither we nor anyone else in this world should ever experience this kind of devastation again; that we can work together for world peace, justice and opportunity for all. While we all have private feeling about this day, we also have many feelings that we share: the horror of these events — disbelief, sadness and rage at the people who did this to us; fear for the future, that this may happen again; and the need to find out how we can help prevent this from ever happening again. And perhaps most of all we share the gratitude towards the firemen, police and soldiers who put themselves in harm’s way to protect us in the hours, days and months that followed. We pay special tribute to the thousands who lost their lives on September 11, including the 343 firefighters and 23 policemen who lost their lives while successfully evacuating thousands of people from the World Trade Center. |
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IR forensics is derived from the fact that all molecules, because of the nonstop motion of their atoms, vibrate at a characteristic frequency which falls within the infrared spectrum. When an individual molecule is struck by an infrared photon that matches its vibrational frequency, it will resonate; and this resonance, detected through a variety of spectroscopic techniques, can be used to precisely identify the molecule, much like a fingerprint can be used to identify an individual person.
The use of IR spectromicroscopy in forensics got its start back in 1949, but its applications were sharply limited because a large sample size was required for analysis. This changed with the commercialization of thermal IR sources such as Globars (TM) in the early 1990s. Globars are silicon-carbide filaments that radiate IR light when heated. Using Globars, forensics researchers are able to work with samples as small as 75 microns, but even that can be excessive when dealing with criminal evidence or precious historical artifacts.
Says Perry, “At the ALS, we can focus IR light down to a 10 micron spot size [.0004 inches] or less. Thanks to the high brightness of the light, we can also get about 200 times the sensitivity of a Globar. This means we can work with much tinier sample sizes and see details that would otherwise be missed using a Globar or any other conventional IR source.”
Says Martin, “Another advantage is that we can shine an ALS infrared beam on an unknown sample and determine its chemical composition without the need for elaborate sample preparations. Also, IR light is nondestructive, in that it does not break any bonds or change the chemical formula of a sample. In tests, we’ve shown that a focused IR synchrotron beam heats a sample by only .5 degrees Celsius.”
 The Infrared forensics team, shown here at ALS beamline 1.4.3: (from left) Tom Wilkinson, Mike Martin, Wayne McKinney, and Dale Perry. |
In their most recent study, the results of which were published in the June 2002 issue of Applied Spectroscopy, Perry, Martin, McKinney, and Wilkinson worked with the U.S. Secret Service to demonstrate the effectiveness of synchrotron-based IR spectromicroscopy on inks.
“The Secret Service is interested because they can use IR data on ink to identify the possible origins of a document, verify that the document is as old as it is claimed to be, and check if the same ink is used throughout a document,” says Perry. “IR data is also potentially effective for identifying chemical aspects in other ink-based items, such as currency and stamps.”
In the past, characterizing ink on paper has been a daunting task. Using a Globar as the IR source, a sample of the ink must be extracted from the paper before it can be analyzed. Typically, a hole is punched through the paper with a hypodermic needle and the ink is chemically separated. This approach is not only destructive, but may also alter the chemistry of the ink before it is analyzed. Further complications arise from the mere act of writing in ink. From the moment the ink is applied to the paper, subtle chemical changes begin taking place as a result of the interaction between ink and paper.
“We overcame these problems using ALS IR photons at wavelengths of 2.5 to 25 microns to characterize ink samples,” says Perry. “Our light beam was so intense we could make rapid and direct spectromicroscopic measurements of the inks without having to chemically separate them from the paper.”
Furthermore, because of the high spatial resolution, the Berkeley Lab researchers were also able to create IR spectroscopic profiles of ink and paper interfaces so that they could determine where one ink ended and another began in the same signature or line of print.
“The superior sensitivity and resolution of our synchrotron-based approach demonstrates its nearly unlimited possibilities for looking at very small fragmentary samples of ink on paper,” says Perry.
Another study done earlier holds important possibilities for criminal and antiterrorism investigations. This study involved the use of IR spectromicroscopy to identify chemical sweatprints. Everyone knows that when you touch something you leave behind a fingerprint, whose pattern of loops, whorls, arches and “tents” is distinctly your own. What you may not know is that you also leave behind a minute residue of chemicals — proteins, salts and fatty acids — whose proportions to one another may also be distinctly your own.
Although the forensic jury is out as to whether chemical sweatprints are as unique as physical fingerprints, the Berkeley Lab researchers were able to correctly distinguish the sweatprints of three individuals.
“All of the oil metabolites in sweat have an IR spectrum,” says Perry. “The question is whether we can find and identify their spectra in the context of the overall IR print spectrum which may contain many additional compounds. However, since we can analyze a sample less than 10 microns across, we have an advantage in that we can work with a sweatprint that is smaller than a single ridge in a physical fingerprint.”
An IR spectromicroscopic profile of a sweatprint might also reveal the age and gender of the person leaving the sweat, and possibly even identify when the sweat was deposited, if the appropriate chemical markers can be observed in the IR spectrum. And since the technique is nondestructive, once an IR profile has been acquired, the undamaged sweatprint can be studied further by other forensic techniques.
Synchrotron-based IR spectromicroscopy should also be applicable to the characterization of trace amounts of biological fluids on cloth, or blood on glass; tracing explosive chemicals, poisons, or illicit drugs to their manufacturers and suppliers; and even identifying the geographic origins of dust particles.
Says Perry, “In light of what we’ve already demonstrated at the ALS, synchrotron-based IR spectromicroscopy as a forensics tool has a bright outlook.”
By Paul Preuss
How do you build a biological sensor that can be used in living organisms, can distinguish between numerous targets at the same time, and can produce bright signals detectable by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)? Start by catching an atom in a cage.
A team led by Berkeley Lab’s Alexander Pines and David Wemmer has done just that: confining laser-polarized xenon atoms inside molecular cages called cryptophanes. Each cage is linked to a ligand or protein that recognizes a specific biological target, creating a sensitive and versatile new NMR biosensor.
Pines and Wemmer, members of the Materials Sciences Division and Physical Biosciences Division respectively, are professors of chemistry at UC Berkeley. To craft the new biosensor, NMR experts from the Pines laboratory joined with molecular biologists in Wemmer’s group.
Know-how in synthetic chemistry came from the laboratory of Peter Schultz, formerly of Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley, now director of the Genomics Institute of the Novartis Research Foundation and professor of chemistry at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif.
“We couldn’t have carried out this experiment without the expertise of different groups,” says Megan Spence of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), who wrote her doctoral dissertation on xenon biosensor research as a graduate student in the Pines lab.
A compound tool
NMR works when there is even a slight excess of spin “up” over spin “down” nuclei with magnetic moments, but optical pumping of xenon vastly increases signal strength by increasing the proportion of spin-up xenon nuclei to 20 percent or more.
NMR signals vary according to the chemical environment of the emitting nuclei; bonding in different chemical compounds causes distinctive “chemical shifts” in the signal from a single kind of atom. Thus different arrangements of cages, linkers, and ligands produce distinct peaks in xenon’s NMR spectrum.
“Compared to other good biosensors like fluorescence technologies, xenon NMR biosensors have two great advantages,” says Spence. “With fluorescence, you have to excite the probes with a laser, so you can’t use them in complex living organisms. But NMR isn’t invasive — the radio waves used travel easily through cells and tissue, so analysis can be done in vivo. And the xenon NMR biosensor can also be ‘multiplexed.’”
Differences arise when sensors bind to different targets, and the cryptophanes themselves can take different shapes or orientations (chirality), each with a distinct chemical shift.
“This means highly resolved, separate peaks, much easier to read than comparable spectra from fluorescence, which tend to overlap,” Spence says.
Building the biosensor
Wemmer’s graduate student Seth Rubin, together with Spence, postdoctoral fellow Ivan Dimitrov, and graduate student Janette Ruiz of Pines’ lab, began by studying weak interactions of free xenon with proteins in solution.
“In some cases, the chemical shifts were larger than expected,” Wemmer says, raising the possibility that xenon NMR could be used to study protein interactions. There was one big obstacle: “Most proteins don’t have a xenon pocket.”
The team came up with the idea of using cryptophanes, invented in the 1980s, as what Wemmer calls an “artificial pocket” for the xenon. But how to bind the cryptophane to a target? They sought a test model.
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“A classic case of protein binding is the biotin-avidin reaction,” Wemmer says. Avidin is a protein found in egg whites that binds strongly to biotin, a B vitamin. Biotin ligands with chemical tethers attached are sold commercially; in theory, all the team had to do was attach the caged xenon to the other end of the tether.
Easier said than done: Schultz and his coworkers, postdoctoral fellows Shao Qin Yao and Feng Tian, contributed essential techniques, including adding a chain of four amino acids to render the cryptophanes soluble in water.
When laser-polarized xenon was added to modified cryptophanes dissolved in water, the cryptophanes quickly filled essentially all the cages with xenon atoms. Xenon’s chemical environment inside the cage made its NMR peak easily distinguished from the peak of free xenon in water.
When avidin from egg whites was added to the mix, another distinctive peak appeared in the spectrum. Checks confirmed that it identified caged xenon bound by biotin ligands to avidin molecules.
New applications
The researchers turned to building assemblies that could identify other target molecules. They used different orientations of amino-acid chains, even different orientations of individual atoms in the tether.
“We are only changing directions of atoms, not the atoms themselves, yet we can build a whole library of chemical shifts indicating subtle changes,” says Spence.
“The body can generate antibodies specific to virtually any target,” says Wemmer, speculating on the numerous possible uses of xenon biosensors. “Maybe we can take that antibody and tie it to xenon in a cage. For any chemical species for which you can get a selective reaction, you may be able to use this method.”
At the United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development, held earlier this month in Johannesburg, South Africa, DOE’s Under Secretary for Energy Robert G. Card announced an expanded effort to deploy energy efficiency and renewable technologies to developing countries.
“Sustainable development in any country calls for an increased use of renewable energy and the efficient use of all energy resources,” Card said. “The United States has a quarter century of experience in developing and using these technologies, working with our research laboratories, public-private partnerships, states and non-governmental organizations. We are committed to sharing this experience with international partners as we work together for a sustainable future.”
DOE’s efficiency and renewable energy programs are a major feature of the United States’ “Clean Energy Initiative: Powering Sustainable Development from Village to Metropolis.” The initiative has three goals: energy efficiency for sustainable development to reduce waste, save money, improve reliability and optimize investments in new generating capacity; the Global Village Energy partnership to bring electricity to the two billion persons in the world now without it and to another billion who experience frequent supply disruptions; and healthy homes and communities to promote cleaner transportation fuels and healthier indoor cooking and heating equipment.
Under Secretary Card’s report at the summit can be downloaded at: http://www.pi.energy.gov/library/ewsl.html.
University biology departments were called upon to demand a better understanding of the physical sciences by their undergraduate students in a report from the National Research Council, which was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). The report urged faculty to improve the quantitative skills of their students by including more concepts from math and physical sciences in their biology classes. Ideally, the report said, the entire undergraduate biology curriculum would be revamped to add more heft.
“Biological research is already highly interdisciplinary, but undergraduate education is not,” said the NRC panel chair Lubert Stryer of Stanford University, in an interview in Science. “And the gap is increasing.”
As an inducement to get cooperation, HHMI has announced it will award $1 million over four years to each of 20 senior faculty members who propose ways to improve undergraduate biology education at their institutions. The idea is to provide role models as well as the necessary resources.
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Bo Bodvarsson, director of the Earth Sciences Division (right), discussed the Yucca Mountain project with two U.C. Regents who visited Berkeley Lab on Monday, Sept. 16. Left to right are Regent Peter Preuss, chairman of the Committee on Oversight of DOE Laboratories, Tracy Davis, former student regent and now assistant to Regent John Moores, Regent John Moores, and Lab Director Charles Shank.
By Ted Gartner
In the Advanced Energy Technologies Department of Berkeley Lab’s Environmental Energy Technologies Division (EETD) researchers experiment with the conversion and storage of energy (batteries and fuel cells), processes that seek to reduce the environmental impacts of energy technologies (reducing the emissions of air pollutants), advanced materials to make energy use more efficient, and biological methods of environmental remediation.
An important part of their research involves developing electrochemical power sources suitable for electric and hybrid electric vehicles (EVs and HEVs). At present, batteries do not hold enough electric charge to drive a vehicle the same distance as a comparable gasoline-powered automobile. Fuel cells can also power cars, trucks, and buses without emitting harmful tailpipe emissions, and may also provide energy to factories and homes without creating smokestack pollution. Much of the funding for this research comes from DOE’s Office of Advanced Automotive Technologies (OAAT), a part of the Office of Transportation Technologies.
Recently the DOE’s Advanced Technology Development (ATD) program called for nominations for two awards: best ATD paper published in 2001 and best individual research accomplishment in 2001. Lab researchers garnered awards in both categories.
The winners for the best paper were the nine authors of “Diagnostic Characterization of High-Power Lithium-Ion Batteries for Use in Hybrid Electric Vehicles”: XueRong (Sherry) Zhang, Phil Ross, Robert Kostecki, Fanping Kong (deceased), Steve Sloop, John Kerr, Kathryn Striebel, Elton Cairns, and Frank McLarnon. All are members of the Advanced Energy Technologies Department except for Phil Ross of the Materials Sciences Division.
The winner for best individual accomplishment went to Advanced Energy Technologies Department’s Robert Kostecki for his work using Raman microscopy as a new diagnostic tool.
The ATD program has three major objectives: to develop and demonstrate the practical application of diagnostic tools at the national laboratories to identify factors that limit calendar life and abuse tolerance for lithium-based battery technology; to assist the developers in the development of practical solutions; and to develop innovative solutions for reducing cell costs.
In cooperation with automobile manufacturers, the DOE’s FreedomCAR and Vehicle Technologies Program is working to develop and deploy advanced transportation technologies that reduce the nation’s use of imported oil and improve air quality.
Published twice a month by the Communications Department for the employees and retirees of Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Ron Kolb, Communications Department head.
EDITOR: Monica Friedlander, (510) 495-2248, msfriedlander@lbl.gov
STAFF WRITERS: Lisa Gonzales, 486-4698; Dan Krotz, 486-4109, Paul Preuss, 486-6249; Lynn Yarris, 486-5375
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS: Jon Bashor, 486-5849; Allan Chen, 486-4210
FLEA MARKET / CALENDAR: 486-5771
fleamarket@lbl.gov /currents_calendar@lbl.gov
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory,
Communications Department, MS 65
One Cyclotron Road, Berkeley CA 94720
Tel: (510) 486-5771 Fax: (510) 486-6641
Berkeley Lab is managed by the University of California for the U.S. Department of Energy.
By Dan Krotz
Berkeley Lab scientists have dramatically increased the efficiency of microfluidic devices in extracting compounds such as biological and chemical toxins from air, soil, and water samples.
Their innovation lies in pairing two existing technologies: microfluidic chips used to isolate compounds from samples, and monolithic porous polymers. This coupling will enable researchers to determine if samples contain extremely dilute molecules, proteins, and microorganisms, including dangerous toxins and biological weapons.
“We will soon be able to collect and prepare a sample, and determine if it contains a substance in the field, using a single hand-held device containing a microfluidic chip,” says Frantisek Svec of Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division. “We’ll take the lab to the sample rather than the sample to the lab.”
A typical microfluidic chip is a small rectangular plate about three inches long and one inch wide. It’s made of glass, silica, or plastic and is trenched with narrow channels. A sample that needs to be analyzed is injected into one of these channels as a tiny stream.
 The tiny disposable chip (far left) can be used to collect samples and test them for toxic substances in the field. To increase the efficiency of microfluidic devices, Lab scientists filled a portion of the chip's channel with a macroporous polymer monolith. |
Most microfluidic chips rely on open-channel architecture, so named because only the channel’s walls are coated with a substance that extracts the desired compound from the stream. Because only the channel’s walls contain this substance, and not the interior volume of the channel, only a small portion of toxin in a sample is absorbed. The remainder flows through uncollected.
To greatly increase the surface-to-volume ratio and therefore the channel’s loading capacity, Frantisek Svec and Jean Fréchet, also of Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division, filled the entire cross section of the channel with a monolithic polymer-based material they invented.
Porous monolithic polymers are a new category of materials developed during the last decade. In contrast to polymers composed of very small beads, a monolith is a single, continuous piece of a polymer prepared using a simple molding process. In this case, the microfluidic chip’s channel serves as the mold.
When this monolithic polymer fills the channel’s cross section, the dilute sample is exposed to much more active surface as it courses through the channel. This increases the opportunity for the chemical interactions that capture the desired compound from the sample. In early tests, for example, Svec and Fréchet increased the concentration of proteins extracted from a dilute solution by a factor of a thousand.
To prepare the polymer in the microfluidic chip, the channel is first filled with a liquid mixture of monomers and porogens. Next, a mask that is opaque to ultraviolet light is placed over the chip. This mask has a small slit that exposes a small portion of the channel. Finally, the mixture is irradiated with ultraviolet light through this tiny opening. This triggers a polymerization process that produces a solid but porous monolithic material, which completely fills the cross section of the channel.
A sample is then injected through this channel, and in a process called solid phase extraction, the porous polymer material absorbs the target compound while the remainder of the sample flows through. This absorbed material is later released using a solvent, allowing researchers to collect and analyze it.
“The porous monolithic material allows us to substantially increase the available surface, which in turn helps to extract a larger amount of a substance,” Svec says. “And increasing the concentration is extremely important because it enables the detection of compounds even in dilute air and soil samples.”
This is especially true when it comes to detecting biological and chemical warfare agents. Although deadly, such compounds tend to disperse widely in the air and water, meaning if such a dangerous compound is in the environment, it’s in a very dilute form. To detect the compound, its concentration must be increased so that the ratio of the compound to the background environment is quite pronounced. This results in fewer false positives – instances in which the supposed detection of a compound turns out to be erroneous.
In addition to increasing the concentration of biological and chemical warfare agents, the technique can be used to prepare samples for DNA sequencing, protein mapping, enzyme assays, chromatographic analysis, and to evaluate the environment for pollutants.
Svec and Fréchet have made additional refinements to enhance the chip’s usefulness in the field. Their chip is made of plastic, making it cheap and disposable as opposed to other chips made of glass, silica, and even quartz.
They can also fine-tune the porosity of the monolithic polymer using a carefully formulated combination of porogenic solvents and reaction conditions. This enables them to create a polymer porous enough to allow a sample to flow through the channel with minimal resistance, but not too porous so that much of the sample isn’t exposed to the polymer.
Ultimately, they will amass a lab’s worth of collection, separation, and detection capabilities in a single chip. In analyzing a solution for specific proteins, for example, their chip will perform a multistep process: collect the sample via solid phase extraction, prepare the sample using enzymatic digestion, separate the peptides, label them, and finally, detect their presence. And it will do this in the field, far from the lab.
“Rather than collect a sample and bring it to the lab, it’s much easier to conduct the complete analysis on site, use the chip once, and throw it away,” Svec says.
By Monica Friedlander
 Martin Kamen with the 37-inch cyclotron in 1949. |
Martin D. Kamen, whose discovery of carbon-14 made radiocarbon dating possible, died of pneumonia on Aug. 31 at his home in Montecito, Calif. A recepient of the prestigious Fermi Award, he was 89.
In 1940, while working with Ernest O. Lawrence at what was then the Radiation Laboratory, Kamen and Samuel Ruben discovered carbon-14 using the 60-Inch Cyclotron. The discovery enabled biologists to decipher the complex chemistry of the living cell.
In 1949, chemist Willard Libby of UC Berkeley made use of carbon-14 to invent radiocarbon dating, which won Libby a Nobel Prize.
Born in Toronto, Canada, to Jewish immigrants, Kamen earned his undergraduate degree in chemistry and his Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of Chicago. He was an accomplished musician as well, often playing with well-known performers such as violinist Isaac Stern.
His rapid rise to fame almost came to a halt in 1944 when Kamen lost his job during the witch hunts for communists toward the end of World War II.
Kamen’s liberal leanings brought him under suspicion during the war years. While working on the Manhattan Project at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, he incurred further suspicion when he correctly deduced that the project had already built a nuclear reactor, even though he was not cleared to know such information.
At a 1944 dinner he discussed radiation treatments for leukemia with two Russian officials he had met at a cocktail party given by Isaac Stern. Kamen was fired the next day. His passport was revoked, he was summoned before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and labeled a spy by major newspapers. At one point he attempted suicide.
The charges proved groundless. Kamen sued the newspapers for libel and won. Half a century later, in 1995, he received the Enrico Fermi Award, the nation’s oldest prize in science and technology, for his lifetime achievement in nuclear physics, in particular for his pioneering contribution to the theory of atomic and radiation physics.
During the 1950s and 1960s he did groundbreaking research on bacterial cytochromes and photosynthesis. Kamen was a founding professor at the University of California at San Diego and also taught at the University of Southern California. In 1985 he published his autobiography, “Radiant Science, Dark Politics.”
Survivors include his son David and sister Lillian Smith.
As Berkeley Lab prepares for its all-day Open House on Saturday, Oct. 5, employees should be prepared for some disruptions and inconveniences in the days prior to the event. In particular, on Friday, Oct. 4, parking will be limited in several major lots.
The “Did You Ever Wonder…?” celebration will in some ways resemble a Big Top — large canopy tents will be erected at several locations to house many of the Laboratory’s Open House exhibits. Beginning with a 50-by-100-foot orientation tent in the large cafeteria parking lot, the outdoor display locations will include the lot in front of Building 50, the lot next to Buildings 70 and 70A, the “Z” lot above Perseverance Hall, and the lot next to the Advanced Light Source.
All of these lots will be closed to parking the Friday before Open House, with employees encouraged to access the Lab via alternative means of transportation. Riggers will be securing the tents throughout the day, raising the possibility of some traffic delays.
Lab employees attending the Open House will be able to park in selected lots onsite; no public parking will be available at the Laboratory, with most visitors taking free shuttle buses from off-site parking locations. Employees who arrive before 9:30 a.m. will be able to park in any open spot outside the so-called “pedestrian zone” around the cafeteria. Off-limit areas will be barricaded. Both the main Blackberry gate and the Strawberry gate will be open; the Grizzly gate will not.
Employees with appropriate identification who arrive by car after 9:30 a.m. will be limited to parking areas along accessible roads. Traffic barriers will restrict access to shuttle bus routes, in particular Lawrence and McMillan roads that traverse the site. Some roads will be converted to one-way traffic only, so employees should drive carefully while onsite during the day, especially as they depart.
Special guests participating in some of Saturday’s events and those with special needs will be accommodated in a VIP parking section below and behind Buildings 50E, 50F and 70A. All cars and trucks should be removed from those spaces by 5 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 4. Cars in parking lots that will be tented on Friday will receive windshield notices on Thursday to vacate by midnight. Remaining vehicles will be towed.
Any questions about parking and traffic arrangements before and at Open House may be directed to Don Bell, head of emergency services, at X6016, or to Sue Bowen, parking supervisor, at X6395. Bell reminds everyone that visitors, including employees, will be subject to automobile and bag searches as part of the continuing security regulations under which the Laboratory is operating.
Of course, employees attending Open House may utilize free parking and bus service available to all off-site visitors. Buses will run every 7 to 10 minutes from the downtown Berkeley BART station, Kleeberger Field lot on campus, the parking garage at the corner of La Loma and Hearst Avenues, and the Foothill lot on Cyclotron Road. Buses will also stop for pickup at the north campus entrance at Euclid and Hearst.
Buses will run from about 9:45 a.m. until 5 p.m., when the last off-site bus leaves the hill.
Employees are also encouraged to clean up their work areas (especially the spaces that will be visited by the public at Open House) during “Clean-Up Week,” Sept. 30-Oct. 4. These areas include the lobbies of the cafeteria, Buildings 77A and 50; facilities that will host tours, including Buildings 46, 58, 2, and 77, the Advanced Light Source, Building 88, and the National Center for Electron Microscopy; and activity labs and lobby in Building 84.
Any trash or used items stored temporarily outside of buildings and work areas should be removed; arrangements to move large items can be made through the Work Request Center.
Visitors will have access to restrooms in open facilities, so valuables and personal items in these buildings should be secured or locked.
Questions about Open House may be directed to Ron Kolb at X7586 or Sonia Mueller at X5944.
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More than 100,000 people participated in the annual Solano Stroll in Berkeley and Albany on a beautiful warm day on Sunday, Sept. 8. Many of the passers-by took the time to stop by Berkeley Lab's booth to learn about Open House, the career fair, and the science at Berkeley Lab.
Manning the booth were Tony Hansen of Engineering and Terry Powell of the Communication Department (pictured here), as well as four staff members from the Human Resources Department — Lori Fong, Sheril Miura, Amy Pagsolingan, and Elizabeth Terrazas — who discussed career opporunities at the Laboratory.
An exhibit entitled “Celebration of the Asian Elephant” will open at the Lawrence Hall of Science on Oct. 12 with a day of special activities about these remarkable beasts. The elephant is a significant cultural and religious symbol for the people of many Asian countries, home to approximately 40,000 elephants.
Activities will include folk art demonstrations, “Floating Elephants” (Thai hot air balloons made of tissue paper), and “A Taste of Thailand.”
A 60-minute film featuring Meg Ryan leading “The Search for the White Elephant” will be shown on opening day and selected weekends.
Current exhibits
Current activities and exhibits at the Hall of Science include “The Idea Lab” and “101 Things Plus to Do,” where visitors may view copies of the 1859 edition of Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection and of the 1687 edition of Sir Issac Newton’s Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy in the original Latin.
The LHS is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information see http://www.lawrencehallofscience.org/.
Serge Gloukhoff, the federal accounts manager at AEC Software, will demonstrate FastTrack Schedule 8 at the next meeting of the LBNL Mac Users Group, to be held from 1 to 2 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 24 in the Building 70A-3377 conference room. This project management software package is cross-platform, OS X native. Windows users are welcome to attend.
Employees have until Sept. 27 to complete the new Integrated Safeguards and Security Management (ISSM) self-assessment questionnaire, available online at http://isswprod.lbl.gov/ISSM/. This process seeks to ensure that Berkeley Lab maintains its current open scientific facility by raising awareness, providing training, and assessing our current security status.
Completing the questionnaire should take only five to 15 minutes. Your LDAP username and password will be needed to access the site. If you do not have an LDAP account or have forgotten your password, contact the Help Desk at X4357. You may also submit a paper copy of the questionnaire.
The Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship Program offers fellowships in Germany to young researchers in all fields of science. The foundation also awards the prestigious Senior Scientist Award, which several Laboratory scientists have won.
The nonprofit Humboldt Foundation promotes international research cooperation by enabling highly qualified scholars who are not residents of Germany to spend extended periods of research in Germany.
More information about the program is available online at http://www.avh.de/. The website is bilingual.
On Monday, Sept. 23 the campus will hold its first memorial to recognize faculty, staff and students who passed away this past academic year and summer. The event will be held from 12:10 to 12:50 p.m. at the flagpole west of California Hall. The memorial seeks to give members of the UC community a means to support one another and reflect on their loss.
To help address related issues, UC has created a website with “Guidelines for Responding to Death,” which can be found at http://death-response.chance.berkeley.edu/. New features include a virtual memorial where any member of the campus community can put up a dedication for a deceased family member, friend or colleague; the use of e-mail to notify departments and individuals who are part of the campus response team; and a new section with guidelines for the death of emeritus faculty or retirees.
Travel Update:
The Travel Office has announced that some of the major domestic airlines are implementing policy changes that could raise the Laboratory’s airfare costs and agency fees. Some of these extra fees can be avoided with careful advanced planning by Lab travelers.
Paper Ticket Fees
Effective Sept. 1, travel agents must collect a $20 fee for issuance of a paper ticket when the itinerary could have qualified for an electronic ticket. The Travel Office encourages employees to use electronic ticketing whenever possible to keep costs down.
If the flight is purchased online via Travel Power and a paper ticket is requested in lieu of an e-ticket, the transaction will be considered full service and will no longer enjoy the benefit of a reduced fare for self-booking.
Exceptions: Southwest Airlines has not yet implemented a fee for paper tickets and United is waving the fee for government fares (YCAL).
Standby flying and itinerary changes
Passengers who purchased domestic, nonrefundable tickets prior to Sept. 6 and are flying no later than Dec. 31, 2002 may still travel standby for alternate flights on their ticketed day of departure with no additional fee. For all other travelers using nonrefundable tickets, a $100 fee will be assessed to to fly standby.
A $100 fee will also be charged for itinerary changes on a nonrefundable ticket purchased for travel after Oct. 1. The changes must be made prior to departure.
Waivers
Most airlines have eliminated waivers of fare or ticketing rules pertaining to advance purchase, minimum and maximum stay requirements, service fees, and other tariff rules.
The new policies vary from airline to airline. For more information see the Travel Department website at http://travel.lbl.gov/Air/index_air.htm.
MAC USERS GROUP MEETING
1 – 2 p.m., Bldg. 70A-3377
SHOEMOBILE
7:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m., cafeteria parking lot
DEADLINE FOR COMPLETING THE ISSM SELF-ASSESSMENT QUESTIONNAIRE
OPEN HOUSE PREPARATIONS
Parking restrictions in effect
OPEN HOUSE
Send us your announcements
Announcements for the General Calendar and Bulletin Board page may be sent to MSFriedlander@lbl.gov. Seminar & Lectures items may be mailed to currents_ calendar@lbl.gov. You may also fax items to X6641 or mail them to Bldg. 65. The deadline for the Oct. 4 issue is 5 p.m. Monday, Sept. 30.
DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS COLLOQUIA
Extra-Solar Planets
Speaker: Geoff Marcy, UC Berkeley Astronomy Department
4:30 p.m., 1 Le Conte Hall
NUCLEAR SCIENCE COLLOQUIUM
The TeraScale Supernova Initiative
Speaker: Anthony Mezzacappa, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
11 a.m., Bldg. 50 auditorium
CENTER FOR BEAM PHYSICS SEMINAR SERIES
Molecular Synchrotron Storage Ring
Speaker: Hiroshi Nishimura, Accelerator & Fusion Research Division
10:30 a.m., Bldg. 74, Room 264 (Albert Ghiorso Conference Room)
Refreshments served at 10:20 a.m.
DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS COLLOQUIA
Examples from Complex Matter Physics: Turbulence, Spatio-Temporal Chaos,
and Biological Networks
Speaker: Eberhard Bodenschatz, Cornell University
4:30 p.m., 1 Le Conte Hall
PHYSICS DIVISION RESEARCH PROGRESS MEETING
CDF Results from ICHEP
Speaker: Marjorie Shapiro, Physics Division
4 p.m., Bldg. 50A, Room 5132
| On Sept. 13, Hans Mark, a former Secretary of the Air Force and director of the National Reconnaissance Office, visted Berkeley Lab and gave a presentation for employees on the U.S. satellite reconnaissance program. A graduate of UC Berkeley, Mark spent nine years as professor and department chairman of Nuclear Engineering. He also served as deputy administrator for NASA and led the engineering development of a number of spacecraft and experimental aircraft. He is currently a professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Photo by Robert Couto |
 |
|
Date |
Course |
Time |
Building |
|
|
10/2 |
EHS 116 |
First Aid Safety |
8:30 – 12:00 |
48-109 |
|
10/2 |
EHS 20 |
ES&H for Supervisors |
9:30 – 11:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/2 |
EHS 60 |
Ergonomics for Computer Users |
1:00 – 2:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/4 |
EHS 260 |
Basic Electrical Hazard Awareness |
9:00 – 10:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/8 |
EHS 10 |
Introduction to ES&H at LBNL* |
8:00 – 10:15 |
50 aud |
|
10/8 |
EHS 330 |
Lead Hazards Awareness |
1:30 – 2:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/9 |
EHS 123 |
Adult CPR |
8:30 – 12:00 |
48-109 |
|
10/10 |
EHS 280 |
Laser Safety |
9:00 – 2:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/15 |
EHS 275 |
Confined Space Hazards |
8:30 – 11:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/15 |
EHS 274 |
Confined Space-Retraining |
11:00 – 12:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/16 |
EHS 256 |
Lockout/Tagout |
10:00 – 1:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/16 |
EHS 530 |
Fire Extinguisher |
10:00 – 11:30 |
48-109 |
|
10/17 |
EHS 400 |
Radiation Protection Fundamentals |
9:00 – 12:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/18 |
EHS 432 |
Radiation Protection-Lab Safety |
8:00 – 12:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/22 |
EHS 276 |
Fall Protection |
9:00 – 10:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/22 |
EHS 735/ 738/739 |
Biosafety/Bloodborne Pathogen |
1:30 – 2:45 |
51-201 |
|
10/22 |
EHS 154 |
Building Emergency Team Training |
1:30 – 3:30 |
48-109 |
|
10/22 |
EHS 730 |
Medical/Biohazardous Waste |
2:45 – 3:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/23 |
EHS 135 |
Earthquake/Wildland Fire Safety |
10:30 – 12:00 |
48-109 |
|
10/23 |
EHS 60 |
Ergonomics for Computer Users |
1:00 – 2:30 |
51-201 |
|
10/24 |
EHS 604 |
Hazardous Waste Generator |
9:30 – 11:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/24 |
EHS 622 |
Radioactive & Mixed Waste |
11:00 – 12:00 |
51-201 |
|
10/24 |
EHS 10 |
Introduction to ES&H at LBNL |
1:00 – 3:00 |
51-201 |
* Includes EHS 392/405, followed by the orientation. Please arrive promptly for sign-in.
To enroll, contact Valarie Espinoza-Ross at VMEspinoza-Ross@lbl.gov or enroll via the web at https://hris.lbl.gov/self_service/training/. Preregistration is required for all courses except EHS 10. For a full, updated schedule, see http://www-ia1.lbl.gov/schedule/.
‘99 HONDA TRX 300EX ATV, red/blk, 5 spd, 2 wd (2X4), exc cond, $3,900/ bo, John, 531-1739
‘97 SUBARU OUTBACK, green, 5 spd, awd, anti-lock brakes, dual airbags, great family car, 100K mi, 500 mi on new engine block, $11,000, Dave or Lauretta, 886-6761
‘97 KIA SEPHIA, 59K mi, 5 spd, sunrf, $1,750, Alexei, X7521
‘96 SUZUKI Sidekick JS, 2 wd, at, ac, cd, 42K mi, ext warranty until 4/03, hard & bikini tops, looks & runs great, $5,200/bo, Leslie, 643-2816
‘94 NISSAN MAXIMA SE sedan, 5 spd, 190HP, 100K mi, dk green, 1 owner, dealer maint, cloth seats, sunrf, abs, Bose w/ cass, runs very well, $6,000, Marcy, X6156, 525-2329
ALBANY, 555 Pierce Str, 1 bdrm condo, unfurn, very clean, new carpet, secure parking, wheelchair access, bay view, storage, pool, tennis court, gym, w&d on premises, 24 hr security, fridge, stove, dw, 12-mo lease, $1,250/mo + $1,500 sec dep, util incl, Mary, X4701, 816-9702
ARLINGTON, furn rm in house, quiet & safe, parking, 2.5 mi from Lab, laundry rm, $600/mo incl util, 527-3764, 309-7221 pager
BERKELEY 1 bdrm furn apt, sunny, quiet, safe, walk to pub trans, near College/Ashby, split level, hill view, incl linen, dishes, hifi, TV, VCR, microwave, garage, flex, avail mid-9/02 for 1 yr, $975/mo, agblako @att.net
BERKELEY 2 bdrm/1 bth, 531 Grizzly Peak, den, w&d, 2 car garage, close to pub trans, avail now, non-smoker, $2,300/mo incl gardening, J.C., 526-7188
BERKELEY HILLS, furn house above the Claremont, 2 bdrm/3 bth, lge office, bay view, liv rm, din rm, kitchen, lge deck, fp, w&d, cable, gardener, easy street parking, walk to pub trans, no smoking/pets, $2,400/mo incl util, $1,000 dep, avail thru Fall ’03 flex, Laura, (925) 253-0163, 642-6411
CENTRAL BERKELEY, nice furn rms, kitchen, laundry, TV, DSL, hardwood floors, linens, dishes, continental breakfast w/ homemade bread, walk to pub trans and shops, $950/mo incl utils, $350/ wk, Jin or Paul, 845-5959, jin.young @juno.com, Paul X7363
EL CERRITO house, char-ming 2 bdrm/1 bth, comp renovated, view, liv/din, lge yard, nr pub trans & shop, hardwd flrs, fp, lge back yard w/ fruit trees, $1,500/mo, first+last mo+ $1,000 dep, non smoking, Craig, 541-0011
MORAGA, Ascot Dr, 3 bdrm/2 bth condo, view, fp, carport, pool, avail 9/15 - 10/1, $1,100/mo, Bob, (925) 376-2211, rrs@value.net
NORTH BERKELEY, 1 bdrm/1 bth upper flat, furn, Glendale/Campus Dr, laundry, deck, off-street parking, on busline, no smoking/dogs, cats neg, $1,100/mo + util, dep & credit report req, Rochelle, (415) 435-7539 msg, 425-6094 pager
PIEDMONT at Montclair border, garden cottage, fully furn, 2-story, 1,000 sq ft, view, 2 bdrm/1 bth in quiet woodsy setting for short-term (up to a month) ren-tal to Lab or campus visitors starting 10/1, Diane, 658-4218, threefor3@ msn.com.
RICHMOND, lge 2 bdrm/1 bth, liv rm, din rm, dw, microwave, kitchen nook, laundry rm, 1 car garage, $1,475/mo + dep, no smo-king/pets, Ed, (707) 537-8489
ROCKRIDGE fully remodeled 3 bdrm/1.5 bth house, w&d, dw, hardwd flr, finished basement, yard, close to pub trans, avail 10/1, $2,200/mo, Otis, X4046
EL CERRITO, 2 bdrm/1 bth, liv rm w/ hardwd flrs, din rm, remod kitchen,1 car garage, 20 min to Lab, close to pub trans, Angela, 701-8084
LBNL RA looking for 1 bdrm apt in Berkeley or N Oakland, Steve, X6966
BUNK BEDS, red metal frame, no matts, $40; 2 unfinished pine CD holders, $5/ea; Kenmore micro/convection oven, $30, Bill, X2958 msg
CERAMIC 20 pc dinnerware set, blk, barely used, srvc for 4 + 4 blk stem Luminarc wine glasses, $30; beaded bracelets, new, $2/ea; cappuccino cup & saucer, new, purple, $5, Melissa, 665 5572 msg
CRIB, exc cond, wood, natural finish, w/ matt, $135, Mike, X7838, 654-0928
DSL/CABLE router, 2 ports w/ cables, $40; 6 wooden chairs w/ pads, $25/ea, Duo, X6878, 528-3408
GATEWAY 433MHz PC w/ 15" monitor, Epson Stylus 440 inkjet printer, multi-function keybrd w/ mouse. surround-sound speakers and DVD, OS Win ME, 192MB + add’l softward & acc, $600/bo, Mary, X6198, 638-1541, 303-8224
KIRKLAND by Whirlpool lge cap washer & dryer, exc cond, 1.5 yrs old, moving, both for $300, Leslie, 643-2816
SF OPERA TICKETS, balc pr, 2nd row ctr, 1 for Saint François d’Assise, pr for Othello, 10/12, some subsequent Sat eves, $63/ea, Paul, X5508, 526-3519
SF OPERA TICKETS, orch pr, row O ctr, 10/10 @ 6:30 p.m., Saint François d’Assise, $236/pr, Craig, 409-0600
NORTH COAST seaside house/cottage for weekend of 10/4 night – 10/6 day, for 8-10 adults, close to ocean, Dimitri, X4974
KAPAA, KAUAI, 2 bdrm oceanfront condo at Kapaa Shore Resort, pool, spa, tennis, fully equipped, ocean view, 3rd floor lanai, sleeps 6, walk to shops and dining, no smoking, $145/ day, $850/wk + 11.4% tax & outcleaning fee, Richard, X6320, 845-1723
TAHOE KEYS at S. Lake Tahoe, 3 bdrm house, 2-1/2 bth, fenced yard, quiet, sunny, close to attractions, priv dock, great view, $195/night, 2 night min, Bob, (925) 376-2211
PIONEER TAPE DECK, not working, Bill, X2958, msg
DK BRN PODIUM from cafeteria lobby, chrome gooseneck mic holder on top, no wheels, possible lab logo velcroed to front, AV Services, X6068
Ads are accepted only from LBNL employees, retirees, and onsite DOE personnel. Only items of your own personal property may be offered for sale.
Submissions must include name, affiliation, extension, and home phone number. Ads must be submitted in writing via e-mail (fleamarket@lbl.gov), fax (X6641), or delivered/mailed to Bldg. 65.
Ads run one issue only unless resubmitted, and are repeated only as space permits. They may not be retracted once submitted for publication.
The deadline for the Oct. 4, 2002 issue is Thursday, Sept. 26.
