By Cynthia Hubert

February 04, 2025

Sacramento State Physics students will conduct research with scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in a new collaboration funded by the federal Department of Energy.

Four Sac State undergraduate students will train on campus this semester before starting summer internships with researchers at Lawrence Livermore in Alameda County. After the internships, they will return to campus to refine the skills they have learned.

The project is funded through a two-year, $800,000 grant, with four more Sac State students taking part next year. Students from CSU East Bay will also be involved, and all participating scholars will receive stipends for their work and expenses.

Using advanced equipment including computer simulations, students will be paired with mentors who work in nuclear science and technology.

The Department of Energy project is the first formal partnership between Sac State Physics and the national laboratory, providing students with valuable research experience that will boost their confidence and help them refine their career paths.

“At a national laboratory, they will get experience that they can’t really get anywhere else,” said Professor of Physics Christopher Hodges, who, along with fellow Physics faculty Rodolfo Barnio Duran and Michael Ray, is spearheading the project. “Conducting research at any national laboratory is a pretty big deal.”

Barniol Duran said Sac State hopes to parlay the internships into an ongoing partnership with Lawrence Livermore.

“We would love to establish a working relationship with them,” he said. “It also would be great if some of our students could be hired there full time.”

The “bookend” approach to the project will allow students to learn more about their Livermore mentors’ research and “hit the ground running” when they arrive at the laboratory, said Ray. “When they return in the fall, they will be able to keep working on their projects here on campus.”

The Livermore internship will give undergraduate Physics students a chance “to learn firsthand what it really means to do research,” said Barniol Duran. “They will be working independently and will have the opportunity to be creative.”

The work could contribute to advances such as the development of sensors that can withstand extremely low temperatures and make very precise measurements in nuclear physics research labs, the professors said.

Knowledge of physics can translate into a wide range of careers, including high school and college teaching, engineering and work in health or energy fields within public agencies or private companies.

The Livermore project is solely focused on student success and helping scholars succeed in their future careers, the researchers said.

“It’s all about supporting students, and showing them how much fun physics can be,” Hodges said.