What makes Los Alamos a leader in V&V?

As previously alluded to, LANL and the U.S. Department of Energy complex have been asked since 1992 to provide an annual certification of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile without full-scale testing. Prior to the NTBS, certification used to rely to a great extent on full-physics, integral testing. LANL, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) were therefore confronted with the difficult task of developing their simulation programs to “replace” testing. After an initial focus on developing the platforms and science-based predictive computer codes, the emphasis is increasingly being shifted to the quantification of prediction accuracy, the assessment of uncertainty, and the formulation of a framework for decision-making that integrates these new tools. Much of this work is still in progress today.

It is emphasized that many industries have indicated a strong interest for, or are currently developing, the M&S approach. Nevertheless, few are deprived of the testing most critical to answer their accreditation questions. In contrast, the design agencies of the U.S. Department of Energy were placed in the absolute necessity to rely on simulations, which explains why Los Alamos has been a driver for the development of V&V and simulation-based certification methodologies.

A second reason has to do with the multi-disciplinary nature of V&V. While it is true that much of the research in predictive sciences and V&V is carried out at Universities and other academic institutions, few of them, if any, possess enough subject-matter expertise in all of the disciplines needed to tackle a complicated validation problem. Such disciplines typically include material sciences, structural and thermal dynamics, engineering, manufacturing, chemistry, physics, statistical sciences, information theory, etc. Remedying this short-coming by increasing cross-departmental or cross-university collaboration is made difficult, at least in the United States, by the current funding mechanisms for academia that reward competition between individuals, departments, and Universities instead of promoting the integration of resources towards a common goal.