Big Ideas Lab

4 Aug 2026 · 21 min

The number of objects in orbit is doubling every two years, and the systems built to keep watch still run on formats designed around 1960s punch cards. At Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a mission operations center called STARMOC is proving that the fu

30 Jun 2026 · 15 min

What happens after a PhD, but before a scientist is fully established? At Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, that in-between stage is treated as a proving ground. LLNL postdocs are given rare facilities, hard problems, mentorship, career development time,

16 Jun 2026 · 21 min

At the National Lab Research SLAM, scientists from all 17 Department of Energy national laboratories get three minutes and a single slide to explain years of complex research to people who aren't scientists. This is the story of how Lawrence Livermore built a

2 Jun 2026 · 17 min

In September 2023, a small NASA capsule streaked through Earth’s atmosphere and landed in the Utah desert, carrying 122 grams of material from the asteroid Bennu. That material has existed for more than four and a half billion years, preserving clues from the

19 May 2026 · 24 min

The Genesis Mission is a national effort to accelerate discovery by uniting AI, supercomputing, experiments, and the infrastructure of the national laboratories. This episode explores the problem Genesis is trying to solve, the growing gap between the pace of

5 May 2026 · 16 min

Scientists are simulating cyber attacks and system failures on real-world energy infrastructure - without ever putting the actual grid at risk. This is Skyfall at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. From real-world incidents like the Ukraine power grid cyb