Big Ideas Lab - About Big Ideas Lab

Episode Date: September 3, 2024

Welcome to the Big Ideas Lab, a weekly podcast that takes you inside Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Hear untold stories, meet boundary-pushing pioneers and get unparalleled access to groundbreaking science and technology. From national security challenges to computing revolutions, discover the innovations that are shaping tomorrow, today.New episodes release weekly. Subscribe now.  ---Big Ideas Lab is a Mission.org original series. Executive Produced and Written by Lacey Peace.Sound Design, Music Edit and Mix by Daniel Brunelle.Story Editing by Daniel Brunelle.Audio Engineering and Editing by Matthew Powell.Narrated by Matthew Powell.Video Production by Levi Hanusch.Guests featured in this episode (in order of appearance):Kim Budil, LLNL DirectorPat Falcone,  LLNL Deputy Director of Science and TechnologyBrian Cracchiola, LLNL Explosive Operations Manager for the Strategic Deterrence DirectorateRazi Haque, LLNL Implantable Microsystems Group LeadJeff Florando, LLNL Associate Program Director for Hydrodynamic and Subcritical Experiments in the Weapons Physics and Design ProgramTom Ramos, Former LLNL PhysicistCarolyn Zerkle, LLNL  Principal Deputy DirectorMichel Mccoy, Former Director of LLNL's Advanced Simulation and Computing ProgramTeresa Bailey, LLNL Associate Program Director for Computational Physics in the Weapons Simulation and Computing TeamMichael Stadermann, LLNL Program Manager for Target FabricationCaitlin Silberman, LLNL ArchivistBrought to you in partnership with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

We are big thinkers. Our job is to take on the problems that go where others might fear to go. In the early days of the Cold War, a Nobel Prize-winning visionary physicist named Ernest Lawrence was on the hunt for anything to give the United States an edge. In 1952, he co-founded a laboratory, a beacon of hope in an era where the balance of global power teetered on the edge of scientific advancement. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. science and technology that has led to breakthroughs in nuclear deterrence, counterterrorism, supercomputing, defense and intelligence, energy security, and much more. Astrophysics and planetary physics, material science, fusion physics, lasers and optics. Resilience to cyber attacks, resilience to climate uncertainties.

Additive manufacturing, 3D printing. High-performance computing, simulation, data science. Human-grade implantable microsystem devices. Fusion ignition. Many of these stories have remained untold. Until now. In this eye-opening weekly podcast, we'll hear from some of Lawrence Livermore's most notable figures,

highlighting how the lab has continued to make the impossible possible, year after year, for more than seven decades. Through its people. This is not a job, this is a career. It's a place where you can have multiple careers at one location. Its purpose. The laboratory was created to answer a challenge, and that's our role, and its focus on the future. Almost everything that we do is looking 10 to 50 years into the

future. It's trying to make a better world, a safer world, a more secure world. If I had to describe my laboratory, I'd say persistence. Overachieving. Innovative. Fondacious. Forward-thinking. Phenomenal. The thing about big ideas is that lots of people have big ideas. The problem is execution and follows. Those are the critical elements. And I would say that Livermore is known for its persistence. We have a big idea. We are given the mandate to pursue it. We face tidal waves of opposition over the years, technical, political, fiscal, all of them. And at the end, the laboratory, the scientists prevail. So it's that persistence that is the key to differentiate between extraordinary institutions and ordinary institutions. Welcome to the Big Ideas Lab.

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