RSS feed source: NIST Buildings & Construction
The event, Additive Construction – The Path to Standardization Continues, will bring together industry and academic stakeholders to discuss gaps in the current standard documents and how the gaps can be filled. Building on previous engagements, this
Click this link to continue reading the article on the source website.
RSS feed source: NIST Buildings & Construction
The fires that devastated many in Los Angeles in January 2025 not only scarred the landscape but also changed the air.
A day after the Eaton fire burned through Altadena, California, chlorine levels in the atmosphere reached approximately 40 times the normal amount, while lead peaked at over 100 times the usual level. Atmospheric chlorine can cause respiratory irritation and distress; lead can cause damage to the brain and central nervous system.
“The Los Angeles fires burned homes and cars, which contain electronics, plastics and other synthetic materials that can give off toxic chemicals when they burn,” said Nga Lee “Sally” Ng, a professor at Georgia Tech.
Ng leads the U.S. National Science Foundation-supported Atmospheric Science and Chemistry mEasurement NeTwork (ASCENT), which includes 12 air quality measurement sites nationwide. Each site has state-of-the-art instruments that help us understand aerosols, or tiny particles in the atmosphere. The network is constantly analyzing the chemical constituents of aerosols with a diameter smaller than 2.5 micrometers, referred to as PM2.5, which contribute to more than 90% of the adverse health impacts associated with air pollution.
Researchers in the ASCENT team analyzed data from three locations across Southern California during and after the fire to reveal that certain aerosols carried a unique chemical signature associated with burning synthetic materials in urban fires.
“We now have a very powerful magnifying glass to see
Click this link to continue reading the article on the source website.
RSS feed source: NIST Buildings & Construction
Lost Radiography Device
Print View Posted on: 13 March 2025
Event Date: 06 March 2025 Event Type: Radiation Source Event Location: United States of America, Mentone, Texas / National Inspection Services, LLC INES Rating: 2 (Provisional)
On March 6, 2025, a radiography crew working approximately 16 km (10 mi) east of Mentone, Texas, reported losing a SPEC 150 exposure device containing a 3.53 TBq (95.4 Ci) iridium-192 source. A trainee set the exposure device on the back of the truck but failed to secure the device in the truck. The source was in the fully shielded position. Shortly after leaving the work site, the radiographers realized the exposure device was no longer in the back of the truck. The radiographers retraced the path they had traveled but did not find the device. Two other trucks passing that way were stopped but the drivers had not seen the device. The licensee has offered a cash award for the return of the device and Texas state authorities issued a press release to alert the public (https://www.dshs.texas.gov/news-alerts/dshs-notifies-public-missing-radiographic-camera-loving-county). U.S. Department of Energy Radiological Assistance Program teams have assisted the licensee and Texas state authorities
Click this link to continue reading the article on the source website.
RSS feed source: NIST Buildings & Construction
NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory, funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science, has achieved a major milestone with the installation of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Camera on the telescope. With the final optical component in place, NSF-DOE Rubin Observatory enters the final phase of testing before capturing the long-awaited and highly anticipated “first look” images, followed by the start of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time.
In early March, the NSF-DOE Rubin Observatory team on Cerro Pachón in Chile lifted the car-sized LSST Camera into position on the Simonyi Survey Telescope. This milestone is a significant step forward in the decades-long story of the LSST Camera’s design, construction and transport to Chile.
Rubin Observatory is jointly funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science. Rubin Observatory is a joint program of NSF NOIRLab and DOE’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, who will cooperatively operate Rubin.
“This is the last major step in the construction of one of the most ambitious scientific facilities ever created,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. “It’s a testament to the technical prowess and dedication of the entire NSF-DOE Rubin Observatory team — and the scientific community that has been striving to get to this point for over two decades.”
“The installation of the LSST Camera
Click this link to continue reading the article on the source website.
