No New Nuke Scientists

Two non-profit groups, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the American Physical Society, voiced their concerns that too many government nuclear specialists are retiring and not enough young scientists are moving to replace them. From the Washington Post:

The pipeline of young researchers who could replace the nation's 35 to 50 nuclear specialists is almost empty, the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science said in a new report at the association's annual meeting in Boston. They called for an invigorated program of university-research funding, more graduate school and laboratory positions in related disciplines, and new incentives for industry support of university positions.

The study's authors, led by Michael May, director emeritus of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, said that boosting U.S. nuclear forensics capability will help deter the black-market smuggling of nuclear materials or a nuclear detonation in a city.

Nuclear forensics can be used to trace the source components of a bomb to the government that produced them and potentially to the experts behind such an attack, subjecting them to the prospect of quick retaliation, the 64-page report said. "A credible . . . capability may deter some who are principally motivated by financial, rather than ideological, concerns," the report added.

I've heard this sentiment before, that the US government needs to "encourage" young folks into learning about nuclear weapons effects, or we'll fall behind in the ability to prepare and respond to nuclear weapons (to include terrorist nuclear incidents). I have a number of thoughts about this, the first being that I didn't think the business area of developing nuclear weapons and creating more rapid response units for nuke terrorism was all that vibrant. While we have seen both chemical and biological terrorism (and we don't have CB forensics experts), we haven't seen nuclear or even radiological terrorism. And yet we're supposed to be worried about this trend?

Somehow, I don't see bin Laden and his boys saying, "oh geez, we can't buy any nuclear bombs from Pakistan or Russia now that the US government has those cracker-jack nuke experts all over the place." If there are corrupt dealers of radiological material or nuclear weapons, I somehow doubt they are thinking of these materials being traced back to them, just as the drug smugglers and those dealing in slave trade aren't that worried about their products. They may be worried about the people they employ, but that's why we need the FBI and DEA, not so much these nuke experts.  I'd rather see the money go to State and better outreach efforts to the Muslim world.

Both the APS and the AAAS want the Bush administration to fund more science and technology education opportunities - they have the idea that all our critical issues, from environmental to energy and national security, could be solved by bringing in and mentoring young scientists and engineers. Maybe. But more of a problem for those proponents of bringing young people into the National Labs is not just getting them trained in the nuclear sciences, but to get them to accept low-paying, boring government jobs instead of private sector jobs in nuclear technologies. I think that's the real obstacle.

Comments

[ajay]

While we have seen both chemical and biological terrorism (and we don't have CB forensics experts), we haven't seen nuclear or even radiological terrorism.

Speak for yourself. There's a man in a double lead-lined coffin in Highgate Cemetery who'd disagree with you.

[CKR]

we don't have CB forensics experts

There was quite an investigation of anthrax DNA after the 2001 mail attacks. The folks who did it weren't called "forensics experts," but that's the kind of thing they were doing.

But that's a quibble.

to get them to accept low-paying, boring government jobs instead of private sector jobs in nuclear technologies.

This is indeed the more substantive problem. After a recent conversation with a current worker, it's clear to me that the jobs at Los Alamos are indeed becoming boring government jobs. T'weren't always that way. I'm not clear on the relative levels of pay. And I'm not convinced that "private sector" government-contract jobs would be any better...

[J.]

ajay, I'll point out that the (alleged) Russian government's killing of an expat in London using a radioactive isotope as a weapon was not a terrorist act but a state-sanctioned hit job. Big difference.

CKR, I'll point out that the fact that medical investigators were looking at the anthrax didn't make it "forensics." Given that they've been unable to pinpoint the source of the anthrax, I will bet that a major reason is that the feds lack the fundamental capability to analyze a biological organism and establish its point of origin a la "CSI."

I will cede to your point on salary comparisons. I've seen some evidence around the Beltway that government has trouble hiring competent scientists and engineers, even when salary is not the issue. The human resources departments continue to suck around here (govt and private).

[Grandjester]

J.

That "CSI" mindset is damn near universal, people think because they seen it on the teevee, it's real.

My business offers audio/video duplication services and we get calls all the time where folks expect us to enhance a decade old answering machine tape, clean up a tenth generation VHS copy or isolate a single voice on some media or another.

I usually refer them to Quantico.

[Alan]

I've heard similar statements about losing specialists with expertise in chemical and biological weapons. By "expertise" is meant the type of knowledge that comes from having actual experience in weapons development. Since there is an absolute prohibition on developing chemical and biological weapons, efforts to "replenish the pipeline" by developing new scientists with such expertise will be on very shaky ground. If the loss of expertise is a real problem, then creative solutions are going to be necessary. (Unless we don't mind legitimizing similar efforts to "develop expertise" in Russia, China, ...)

But I wonder just how big a problem this really is, and even more, whether we really need to have people with weapons expertise in order to have forensics and investigations capabilities adequate to today's chemical and biological challenges (I can't comment on nuclear). Somehow I doubt it, but it's an interesting question.

As for APS and AAAS wanting more funding for science and technology education opportunities - this has become a constant refrain from the science lobby any time any issue that even touches on science comes up. It's not just "when all you have is a hammer...," it's "when all you are is a hammer..." Maybe it is a solution - but before we blindly go down this alley, we should consider what we may reap (see my comment about Russia, China....).

[CKR]

On the anthrax investigation, DNA was analyzed to determine what strain it was, and thus where it might have come from. That sounds like forensics to me. IIRC, the results were ambiguous. But it's still forensics.

[Smiley]

... to get them to accept low-paying, boring government jobs instead of private sector jobs in nuclear technologies.

IMHO, this is the most substantive problem. Entry level government jobs pay squat. A young post-doc (nuclear physicist/engineer) can earn almost 1.5 to 2+ times what an entry level government worker (government service) can earn.

Aside: DOE labs can offer better compensation packages than the USG since they are government-owned/contractor-run organizations. Plus, you will work for a known "name" in the nuclear field in a DOE lab vice USG.

I constantly hear the need for young scientists with experience to replace the gray beards but the USG is not willing to pay the market rate. The USG tends to use IPAs* to attract talented individuals from the labs and academia to work for the government. IPAs, especially filling SES positions, earn considerable more that the typical government SES payscale.

DoD relies heavily on the DOE labs for their nuclear expertise (weapon effects, forensics, detection, etc)... After all, they are the worldwide recognized experts. Although the USG does not hire these individuals directly as government civilians, they pay a premium for their knowledge and services (The administrative cost of developing, executing, and maintaining contracts; lab salaries for scientists, managers; lab overhead, etc. are not inexpensive! If you want to see money disappear quickly, hire a national lab!)

As the old adage states... you get what you pay for.

What's the future for a nuclear weapon designer in today's society?

Los Alamos and Livermore are the two premier design labs. A young designer can design and model a new weapon but will never be able to actually "test" the design. Sounds like fun for a scientist/engineer... (However, I have met a nuclear weapon designer that was as happy as he could be working as a weapon designer. It was his life long dream.)

*The Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA)Mobility Program provides for the temporary assignment of personnel between the Federal Government and state and local governments, colleges and universities, Indian tribal governments, federally funded research and development centers, and other eligible organizations.

Smiley

[James]

I agree with Smiley. I think at least one of the problems is that bright, ambitious engineers like to build stuff rather than theorize about how stuff is built. If all our hopes and dreams work out, we won't build any more nuclear weapons and that tends to turn off some young people who have lots of other career options. Throwing money at the problem just isn't going to change this.

Perhaps replacing the engineers and physicists we have is the wrong task. Maybe we should be looking for very different people than the ones that got into the game to design state-of-the-art weapons. "Forensic medicine" is very different from "heart surgeon," requiring a different sort of person. The people who would very much like to be involved with verification of arms control treaties might be reluctant to enter a specialty where they are called upon to build new weapons.

With RRW still up in the air the mission for future nuclear scientists is unknown and this might be holding back students who want to know what they'll be doing when they get out of school. I predict that the problem will ease when/if the US government ever comes up with a coherent nuclear policy.

[CKR]

Many of the nuclear weapons scientists who "got into the game" some time ago were actually from other specialties, had planned to do something quite different. Astrophysicists, for example. The academic market for such being lower than the number of graduates, those graduates had to find jobs somewhere. And it turns out that those nuclear reactions in stars are just like what goes on in a thermonuclear weapon...

Folks who aspire to building nuclear weapons are the ones that worry me, although there aren't large numbers of them.

And the article that J. cited is talking about the nuclear forensics folks, still another breed, although they all talk to each other. Nuclear forensics tends to draw people with an interest in nuclear chemistry, the ones who'd like to make new elements with high atomic weights.

[Smiley]

I've seen some evidence around the Beltway that government has trouble hiring competent scientists and engineers, even when salary is not the issue. The human resources departments continue to suck around here (govt and private).

J, I do not think it is necessarily that all of the HR departments suck in the Beltway. I think it has more to do with living in the the greater DC area. Who wants to live in the NCR when you can live elsewhere with equal/better standard of living? High cost of living (house, taxes, etc), traffic, nasty commute,... It gets old after a while.

I'm sure that entry-level government jobs are not high on the list of your top undergraduate college grads (or even on the radar for PhDs and post-docs in the sciences and engineering). I would venture to guess that you are probably getting the bottom 50% of the class. Remember, these are the individuals that stay in the government and eventually become science and technology managers. (USG does a great job of excelling at mediocrity.) Do you think that the best and the brightest want to work in this environment? (It's like Dilbert on steroids.)

I don't mean to paint a bleak picture. There are many great government civilians. However, they seem to be in the minority. There are also moments of brilliance in the government... Manhattan project, early NASA, etc. In these cases you clearly have projects that cannot be done by anyone else but the USG and they are important/worthwhile enough to attract talented individulas.

I'll agree that government HR leaves a lot to be desired. But then again, you get what you pay for.

[Benn Tannenbaum]

I'd urge you to read the report before making sweeping dismissals of what we say. It's online at http://cstsp.aaas.org/content.html?contentid=1546

We don't say that we need scads of new scientists and engineers to design new weapons. We say that we need a small cadre (30-50) of new scientists and engineers to maintain the workforce in this field.

The bottom line, in our minds, was this: if a nuclear weapon is detonated anywhere on the planet, you and everyone else will want to know who did it. We've got a small capability to do that forensic and attribution work now, but the people who do it are not getting any younger. The only way to maintain that tool is to get people back into that particular pipeline.

Anyway, read the report, and then feel free to dismiss it. But I hope you'll find we've made our case.