Robots to retire nuclear bombs.

The U.S. government has retired a growing number of nuclear weapons since the dawn of the Atomic Age. But if Uncle Sam's emissaries conclude nuclear-arms-reduction accords with the former Soviet Union, the Department of Energy (DOE) will have to prepare for a torrent of retirees at its Pantex plant in Amarillo, Texas -- the facility where most of the weapons were initially assembled. Because each weapon is taken apart by hand, stepping up the bomb-dismantling rate could dramatically increase radiation exposures for plant workers. "So there's a big push at DOE to automate the process," says Patrick J. Eicker, director of Sandia's Intelligent Systems and Tobotics Center. By the end of the year, his lab plans to deliver a robot system to Pantex to give workers a hand with the "dirties" jobs.

Initial stages of taking a bomb apart -- picking it up, placing it on a work surface and removing its couter casings -- pose little risk of radiation. Workers will continue these tasks, Eicker says. But then Sandia's robot will step in. After removing a layer of high explosives that surrounds the heart of the bomb, the robot will carefully lift out an enclosed ball of plutonium or uranium and seal it inside a shielded canister.

Working with mock-ips, Eicker's group is testing the one-armed robot on each dismantling stage. Though the precise activities the robot's interchangeable, tool-bearing hands will tackle are classified, Eicker says they'll include unscrewing, ungluing, lifting apart and repackaging. Because bomb designs differ so widely, Eicker's team is designing its automaton to be very flexible -- and to carry a big tool kit.