Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Nuclear Science Division
Nuclear Science Division
At Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, scientists come together to answer some of the greatest questions in science. The Nuclear Science Division conducts research aimed at understanding how nuclei, nucleons, and nuclear matter emerge from the strong interactions among fundamental particles. This includes study of the structure and interactions of nuclei, as well as the forces of nature manifested in nuclear
matter. The problems we tackle are at the forefront of basic research in
nuclear science. We also apply technologies and techniques developed for basic research to problems facing humanity.
In this film, we will talk about neutron star mergers, which were long predicted and only recently actually observed. Using advanced
supercomputers at Berkeley Lab, we can calculatehow they affect
the synthesis of heavy elements. We will see how a state-of-the-art
instrument --- the Heavy Flavor Tracker at the STAR experiment ---
is used to unravel the inner workings of the quark soup that existed in the very early universe. We will also talk about gamma-ray tracking applications and the use of 3-D scene data fusion to survey radiation in the environment, particularly in Fukushima Prefecture in Japan.
These are just several examples of amazing research being pursued at
Berkeley Lab. In addition to the highlights above, scientists in the Nuclear Science Division are doing experiments to determine whether the neutrino is its own antiparticle, measuring the properties of exotic nuclei – either
super heavy elements with the maximum number of protons and neutrons, or lighter nuclei with so many neutrons that they are nearly unbound, figuring out what fraction of the proton’s half-integer spin is carried by the gluons that keep it together, and calculating basic properties of the nucleon
from first principles on the biggest supercomputers available.