A-1: Information Systems & Modeling

Information Systems & Modeling

Providing Insight on a Complex World

The world is more complex and interconnected than ever before, and national leaders require science-based insights to make the most informed decisions.

• Provide R&D solutions in support of critical infrastructure, countering weapons of mass destruction, threat agent dispersion models, data analytics, and proliferation activities of weapons-usable nuclear materials.
• Recognized as a national leader in addressing scientific national security challenges in modeling, optimization, and data analytics. 

TECHNICAL FOCUS AREAS

Critical Infrastructure Modeling

Protecting critical infrastructure is one of our nation’s most important national security concerns. Understanding the complex interdependency of these systems is a crucial aspect of maintaining their integrity. A-1 performs basic and applied research focused on modeling the nation’s critical infrastructures, quantifying vulnerabilities, and developing algorithms.

Capabilities

• Integrated Control and Optimization Under Uncertainty
• Design of Resilient Infrastructure Systems
• Interdependent Energy Networks
• Analysis of Extreme Events and Threats To Infrastructure
• Key National Service—Applying LANL-Specific Expertise to Infrastructure Problems of National Concern
• Physics-Inspired Machine Learning and Data Analytics
• Power System Modeling and Computation—Advanced algorithms

Data Analytics & Forecasting

In our complex world, data analytics is increasingly important for national security. It involves the integration of disparate, dynamic, and distributed data to improve our ability to identify, characterize, and forecast critical events. A-1 performs basic and applied research focused on modeling and understanding emerging threats such as disinformation, disease outbreaks, political instability, and nuclear proliferation. 

Capabilities

• Development of workflows and tools to ingest, process, and analyze large heterogeneous real-time data streams to forecast events
• Incorporating human behavior into models
• Expertise applying statistical, mechanistic, machine learning, and agent-based modeling techniques to real-world national security challenges
• Using natural language processing techniques to elicit useful signals from many different text modalities across different languages
• Disease modeling and forecasting (e.g., COVID forecasting)
• Political instability modeling
• Dis/misinformation analysis
• Data fusion at scale to inform emerging global threats

Chemical, Biological, and Radiological Agent Dispersion Modeling

Capabilities

• Chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear plume modeling
• Atmospheric sciences
• Fast-running dispersion modeling
• Urban and indoor plume modeling
• Complex terrain modeling
• Fire spread modeling

National Security Information Systems

A-1 develops information systems that support a variety of U.S. government entities in the areas of policy advice, non-proliferation, treaty verification, and threat assessment.

• Information systems to support analysis of export commodities for proliferation risk