Original Date: 01/23/1995
Revision Date: 01/18/2007

Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) is a Department of Energy (DOE) multiprogram national effort that maintains sites in New Mexico and California with test facilities in Nevada and Hawaii. Headquartered in Albuquerque, NM and operated by the Sandia Corporation, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Martin Marietta, SNL employs over 8500 personnel and has an annual budget of more than $1.4B. The laboratories have facilities for manufacturing process development, environmental testing, renewable energy, radiation research, combustion research, computing, and microelectronics research and production.

Sandia's research-based engineering efforts are solidly based on a matrix of core competencies. Comprised of two critical elements, research foundations and integrated capabilities, Sandia's core competencies have been developed and advanced by 40 years of research and development in nuclear weapons, energy, environmental, and work for other government agencies. These core competencies are critical to SNL's long-term success and constitute their singular capabilities in the national laboratory field. Engineered processes and materials, computational and information sciences, microelectronics and phototonics, and engineering sciences comprise Sandia's four major research foundations. These are complemented by and rely on the laboratories' integrated capabilities of Advanced Manufacturing Technology, Advanced Information Technology, Electronics, and Pulsed-Power.

Originally tasked with nuclear weapon development, SNL has expanded their mission beyond that of researching and developing programs for solutions to military security, energy security, environmental integrity, and work for other government agencies. SNL now also maintains a goal to team with industry in programs to include advanced manufacturing technologies, improved transportation, cost-effective health care, and information/computation science and technology. These new responsibilities are in response to the changing global environment and Sandia's endeavor to share technology to enhance America's global competitiveness and the national quality of life.

As one of the premier laboratories in the nation, Sandia offers industry and government a rich research and development resource. Sandians have researched and assiduously recorded information on complete process life cycles - information which industry needs. From years of experience in scientific areas, Sandia has also examined and developed numerous related technological concepts which have practical applications in the industrial arena. For example, the design-for-environment system EcoSys(TM) can provide designers and process engineers with perspectives on the relative environmental impact between alternate designs. This information system taps into detailed life cycle, product, process, and material data that is critical to the analysis. Another example is Sandia's work in low-volume statistical process control – a topic of vital interest to many manufacturers who are engaged in small quantity production or apply agile manufacturing techniques. Theoretical statistical research with limited production, coupled with integrating new and traditional SPC methods with adaptive filters, are providing enhanced tools for low volume process controls.

SNL's research and development in modeling and simulation projects also provide excellent examples of technology applicability in the commercial world. The SNL-developed Multi-Dimensional User-Oriented Synthetic Environment is a virtual environment to provide users with an enhanced capability to examine, question, and understand relationships in complex information space. This system simplifies development of interactive graphical models and software, and creates a user-controlled environment to amplify the speed of human perception of that information. Manufacturing design and assembly analysis, operation of a multi-chip module, data analysis of seismic information, medical imaging, and dynamic simulation of explosive welding are just a few uses to which the Multi- Dimensional, User-Oriented Synthetic Environment has already been applied.

Much of Sandia's work - as with several other government institutions - has been conducted behind required walls of security, and the shift to outreach programs has been a challenging one. However, Sandia continues to share lessons learned through hundreds of Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) and industry-government technology transfer efforts. One such project is the Technologies Enabling Agile Manufacturing group through which SNL and other DOE facilities, together with agencies such as the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Science Foundation, Agile Manufacturing Enterprise Forum, and the Society of Manufacturing Engineers, disseminate integrated design-to-manufacture tools and identifies processes for streamlined and cost effective product development.

Sandia National Laboratories is staffed with personnel who are innovative, independent-thinking, motivated, and represent a critical element of this national resource. This high level of expertise is as much a strength of SNL as the transferable technology. This combination of personnel, research and development proficiency, and technical capabilities makes Sandia a vital element in maintaining the United States' energy security as well as its environmental integrity and global economic competitive position.

This survey was supported by the United States Department of Energy under Contract DE-AC04-94AL85000.

TABLE OF ACRONYMS:
The following acronyms were used in this report:

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