FPN02-17

Sandia's Z-Beamlet Recognized

April 1, 2002

The Z-Beamlet facility at Sandia National Laboratory has won a "special mention" for engineering in R&D Magazine's 36th annual competition for the renovated laboratory of the year. The award was announced on March 20 in New Orleans and will be described in the May 2002 issue of the magazine. The panel of judges included architects, researchers, equipment suppliers, lab design consultants and editors of the magazine.

John Porter, manager of the Z-Beamlet facility said, "I am very pleased. It always feels good to be recognized for hard work." Mike Hurst, Z-Beamlet operations coordinator, accepted the award in New Orleans.

Z-Beamlet was created from the prototype beam developed for the National Ignition Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and using it as a backlighter diagnostic for the Z-pinch fusion experiments at Sandia. The facility is also being prepared for use in fast ignition tests of compressed fusion targets.