Big Ideas Lab
Every decision in national security hinges on knowledge, insight, and expertise - some of that expertise starts in a lab in Livermore.
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Steven Creek had just arrived in Washington DC for his first DC assignment. Suitcase in hand, badge, freshly enrolled to access Forestall Building, ready to begin his first day with the NMSA, the National Nuclear Security Administration. Steven is a nuclear and radiochemistry scientist from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and he was prepared to tackle nuclear proliferation threats, working for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation in NMSA alongside the Department of Defense. But this wasn't your average first day heading to a new work site.
It wasn't an average day for anyone.
Another plane has just hit, it hit another building, flew right into the middle of it, explosion.
It was September 11th, 2001. By the end of that morning, everything had changed.
There are "good indications" that people with links to the Osama bin Laden organization are responsible for today's attacks.
Citizens grieved, the nation reeled, and the government sprang into action.
Less than 40 miles from downtown Manhattan, after major concerns over safety and the possibility of the facility being a future target.
Thousands of utilities, chemical plants, nuclear plants, all being told they could be Al Qaeda targets.
Many of the security measures now in place came about after the 9/11 attacks.
A few days after 9/11, Steven was swept into the urgent effort to support the White House and worked with US Customs, the New York Port Authority, and commercial mail carriers to help them understand and mitigate potential nuclear and radiological threats to our airports, bridges, ports, and other critical infrastructure.
And we are in an elevated global threat environment.
The threat has evolved, and there are new challenges now.
created in a reinvention of America's security. He also supported first responders that might deal with nuclear materials or respond in the aftermath of an attack.
Responders have to be prepared for just about anything these days, including a nuclear emergency.
We're being tasked with more and more things. Homeland security being one of them. Radiation's a definite concern.
Those efforts helped to lay the foundation for what would eventually become the Radiological and Nuclear Countermeasures Program in the Department of Homeland Security's Science and Technology Directorate. His nuclear threat reduction efforts were one of the few named programs to be transferred from NNSA to the newly established DHS in the Homeland Security Act. But why was Stephen in DC in the first place when his office was across the country in California? He was there to fulfill his first off-site assignment through the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Walk through any federal building and you might spot them. A Livermore face among the crowd. Not visitors. Not consultants. Fellows. Some are sent to Washington, others remain local in Silicon Valley, and a select few even concentrate their efforts toward the final frontier: space. But whether DC or deep space, Lawrence Livermore brings its expertise where it's needed most: through the Off-Site Fellows Program.
Welcome to the Big Ideas Lab, your exploration inside Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Hear untold stories, meet boundary-pushing pioneers, and get unparalleled access inside the gates. From national security challenges to computing revolutions, discover the innovations that are shaping tomorrow, today.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is hiring. If you're passionate about tackling real-world challenges in science, engineering, business, or skilled trades, there's a place for you at the lab. Right now, positions are open for a Senior Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Engineer, and a Senior Business Operations Specialist. These are just a few of the more than 100 exciting roles available. At Lawrence Livermore, you'll work on projects that matter, from national security to cutting-edge scientific advancements. Join a team that values innovation, collaboration, and professional growth.
Explore opportunities at llnl.gov/careers, where your next career move could make history. When you think of a scientist's career, your mind might flash to a white lab coat, the careful pouring and measuring of chemicals, and the thrill of a groundbreaking experiment. At Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, those things are certainly present. But the work of a scientist also extends far beyond the conventional laboratory into more surprising, non-traditional, collaborative spaces.
The Offsite Fellows Program allows Lawrence Livermore employees to accept temporary assignments in governmental host offices and agencies to lend their guidance, expertise, and knowledge on complex national security issues. Working side by side with the United States federal government isn't optional, it's essential. So the Offsite Fellows Program is this gem of a program at the lab. We help connect the lab with agencies, mostly in Washington DC, through these short-term fellowships. That's Katie Shaper, the Offsite Fellows Program Manager. Like a compass, she helps guide lab experts toward the government agencies that would benefit from their knowledge most. One of the things that was really, I think, attractive for me about this position in particular is that I kind of get to
Help the lab connect with agencies in Washington DC and help them kind of speak the same language. From supporting nuclear strategy at the Pentagon to advising Congress to helping create and working alongside of the Department of Homeland Security, these fellows act as the lab's frontline employees. They both represent Livermore and help build the bridge between science and policy, ensuring one informs the other and that the two remain closely linked. But these ideals didn't start with the program. They began with the creation of the lab itself.
In September of 1952, at an abandoned naval air station near Livermore.
Since its inception, Lawrence Livermore has held a strong commitment to ensuring science reaches beyond its doors. They've been sending lab employees into government agencies to lend support for years. However, in 2018, the lab officially formalized decades of governmental collaboration by creating the Offsite Fellows Program. What had long been an informal tradition of sending scientists into host agencies transformed into a structured initiative. Since then, the program and its impact have only grown, both in size and in breadth. We place employees in agencies typically Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration.
Our employees are placed in those agencies for typically two or three years. Each department is unique and each has a role in our national security. That support fellows give can play out in many different ways. I think that's what makes this program really critical is that the lab is kind of directly lending its expertise in the rooms where major decisions are being made. We're helping the government respond better to threats and maintain its security. And for the fellows, offsite assignments build skills that last long after a placement ends. It's a really unique opportunity, I think, for the employees. They get to see how these agencies operate, how decisions are being
And it gives them kind of the broader context that the lab is operating in. So they see kind of the bigger picture of the national security complex and how Livermore fits into it.
While being an offsite fellow provides career development and exposure for scientists, it also requires more than simply expertise in their scientific field.
I would say there's two things that I think are really important regardless of what assignment we're looking for. The first is having a really strong understanding of the lab, like a really solid network that they can draw back on and to just have spent enough time to know not only their area of expertise, but what other areas of expertise are at the lab and how to tap into those if something were to come up while they were on assignment. The second area I would say is communication skills. It's so important for our folks on assignment to be able to really connect with their host offices. And typically that means taking a really technical and scientific concept and translating it into something that someone that does not have a scientific background at all can really understand and utilize.
Some of those complexities take fellows into the depths of arms control and global security. Others take fellows to explore the future of national defense on a cosmic level.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is hiring. If you're passionate about tackling real world challenges in science, engineering, business, or skilled trades, there's a place for you at the lab. Right now, positions are open for a Senior Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Engineer and a Senior Business Operations Specialist. These are just a few of the more than 100 exciting roles available. At Lawrence Livermore, you'll work on projects that matter, from national security to cutting-edge scientific advancements. Join a team that values innovation, collaboration, and professional growth. Explore opportunities at llnl.gov/careers, where your next career move could make history.
From 2021 to 2024, Livermore off-site fellow Barry Kirchendahl served as technical director for the Defense Innovation Unit's space portfolio, where he led efforts to bring emerging commercial space technologies into national defense. The Defense Innovation Unit, or DIU, acts as the Pentagon's innovation hub for adopting and developing commercial technology for national security purposes. Stationed in Silicon Valley, industry and military leaders arm their posts and help identify, adopt, and apply commercial solutions to Department of Defense problems. And while there are a myriad of unique obstacles to overcome in space exploration, the greatest isn't imagination or technology, it's funding.
With space, it was totally undoable. You couldn't do it, you couldn't afford it, it was not possible.
Breakthroughs weighed on the launch pad, but without investment, even the most promising innovations remain grounded. However, coupling commercial innovation with space exploration begins to unlock possibilities. Space suddenly becomes more affordable, not because challenges are smaller, but because costs are shared.
When you mix in space with commercial, now you can start affording it because when you're dealing with a company venture capital funded, the government doesn't have to foot all the money.
Barry's mission was to connect the then Department of Defense, now called the Department of War, with non-traditional companies developing technologies that could secure America's presence in the cosmos. If the government can map the route and private firms can carry supplies, together they can explore uncharted frontiers. This kind of collaboration forms a joint expedition that pushes the bounds of technological innovation. It advances space exploration, and as a result, strengthens national security at a rocket-powered pace. An example of this is the hypersonics program that Barry started during his time at DIU.
They said, "Hey Barry, can you look into the role of commercial companies for hypersonics?"
Hypersonic vehicles fly faster than the speed of sound and are incredibly useful when it comes to leveraging missile infrastructures for national defense purposes. So developing a hypersonics program had been a national security priority at the Pentagon for a long time. But private companies were already pouring money into hypersonic transport for passengers and cargo.
We have a lot of great things for our conventional and nuclear deterrent, obviously, here in the US. And so our role for hypersonics is different. In a lot of ways, the commercial side was that we're falling behind, that we need to get more success.
The pace of research in the hypersonics field had increased, but the facilities for testing new technology weren't able to keep up. Due to budget constraints, building new testing ranges wasn't an option. Barry and his team proposed a solution. Create the Hi-CAT. Hypersonic and high cadence airborne testing capabilities. The goal of the program was to find commercial partners who can deliver a prototype aircraft that can fly faster than Mach 5, carry experimental payloads, and generate the performance data America's hypersonics program requires. This was made possible when Barry began blending commercial companies with governmental initiatives.
He also aligned another hypersonics program to further our national security development in space.
There's a program called Mach TB. That is basically a government test bed that's been set up to use commercial equities to drop the cost of testing and increase the cadence of testing. And I got this program at DIU aligned with that effort, and we've got launches coming up immediately for that.
For Barry, participating in the Offsite Fellows program meant leveraging commercial innovation to increase hypersonic testing. But that's not the case for every lab employee. For Heather Whitley, being a fellow meant accepting a remote role in the throes of the COVID-19 global pandemic with the NNSA's Office of Experimental Sciences. This office manages funding for a diverse portfolio of NNSA resources for experimental studies, ranging from the National Ignition Facility to expanded capabilities for hydrodynamic and subcritical testing. The Offsite Fellows program opens doors to remarkable opportunities for every employee that participates.
But federal collaboration is a maze, full of twists, turns, and hidden challenges that require careful navigation. Fellows must adapt, learning to translate complex science into accurate, relevant advice.
I think there's a challenge in adapting the style of communication from at the lab, where I think people are really interested in all of the details, to an environment in DC where the policymaker might need to know just the most important thing.
And for specialized assignments, they often require training.
With the Pentagon, we find that folks just don't have as much exposure to that world while they're at the lab. It's just a little harder to access. It's not necessarily something that people would come across in their day-to-day work here.
The training program aims to prepare fellows for a new, typically uncharted environment that differs significantly from day-to-day laboratory operations. The Offsite Fellows program also reaches a multitude of different agencies, each with its own individual cultures and priorities.
One of the biggest challenges of this program is that there's so many different bureaucracies to align. At a given time, we probably work with maybe 10 different organizations.
Before 2018, the lab sent its scientists to just a few key organizations, like the Nuclear Weapons Council and an NSA Science Council. But once the program was formalized in 2018, its reach began to expand. Before the program was officially established, the lab supported around 15 assignments per year. In the past seven years, that number has tripled to around 45 assignments annually. Today, while NSA and the Department of War remain core partners of the Offsite Fellows program, the fellows have also served in the Executive Office of the President, the House of Representatives, the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and even the Governor's Office
of California.
We're constantly considering new opportunities. We've participated in the Embassy Science Fellowship, which is a State Department program that places scientists with embassies to help work on specific We frequently get requests from a number of agencies and we kind of evaluate them to determine which ones are really best aligned with the lab's priorities and interests.
This ensures that the nature of each assignment is different and each fellow's journey is unique. But the mission never changes: to deliver Livermore expertise where it matters most, strengthening national security at every level. When Barry Kirkin Dahl returned to Livermore in May 2025, he didn't just carry the experience from launching national security initiatives into orbit. He brought vision, new relationships, and a deeper understanding of federal priorities from his time spent with the Pentagon.
I've come to see that it's critical thinking that the government really needs. There's a million different ideas. They need to know, what should I do? There's a million things I could do. What should I do? And that ability, what we do here, we critically think.
By placing expert scientists at the heart of government, it ensures imperative national security decisions are guided by real knowledge, not guesswork.
Just recently, I was in the Pentagon, visiting with one of our folks on assignment, and his manager stopped by and was just like, "Thank you so much for lending him. You have no idea how impactful his time in our office has been. We could not have done any of the things we wanted to do this year without having him here."
When Stephen Creek returned from that first Offsite Fellows assignment in 2005, he wasn't the same scientist who had walked out the door. Navigating the aftermath of 9/11 and creating a new government agency gave him hands-on experience that developed leadership, strategy, and adaptability. He then held a number of leadership roles in nuclear threat reduction, and then took a second DC assignment to NNSA in 2019, working for a political appointee. Upon returning from that second assignment, he helped lead the lab's return-to-new-normal team, launching the lab's hybrid work posture. And today, as HR Deputy Associate Director, he applies that leadership and technical management
experience every day to helping oversee a major technology transformation of the laboratory's personnel management business systems. The Offsite Fellows program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is more than a temporary assignment. It's a way to share ideas, perspectives, and purpose. Clarity for the agencies. Perspective for the scientists.
And real technical knowledge at the heart of America's critical national security decisions.
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Looking for a career that challenges and inspires? Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is hiring for a power grid dynamics engineer and a transmission grid engineer, along with many other roles in science, technology, engineering, and beyond. At the lab, every role contributes to groundbreaking projects in national security, advanced computing, and scientific research, all within a collaborative, mission-driven environment. Discover open positions at llnl.gov/careers, where big ideas come to life.
Page updated October 31, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated