Summer Sundays Bring Thousands of Visitors to Brookhaven National Laboratory

Crowds of visitors got a chance to see the Center for Functional Nanomaterials, National Synchrotron Light Source, and Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider

August 7, 2015

On four weekends in July and August, Brookhaven National Laboratory held its annual Summer Sundays open houses. These popular themed visitors days open up the Lab’s facilities to community members for tours of Brookhaven’s cutting-edge Center for Functional Nanomaterials (CFN), National Synchrotron Light Source II (NSLS-II), and the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC). The fourth weekend is dedicated to Family Fun Day, where parents can bring their kids to tour Brookhaven’s Fire House and visit the Science Learning Center. 

“Summer Sundays are a great chance to share with our local community the exciting work we do at Brookhaven and the amazing facilities we have,” said Kahille Dorsinvil, who took on coordination of Summer Sundays this year. She has worked at Brookhaven since 2006, and recently joined the Stakeholder Relations group, which puts on Summer Sundays each year. 

These open house days always draw crowds of visitors, and this year was no different. Visitors to CFN totaled about 750, and at NSLS-II there were about 940. For Family Fun Day, 1170 people visited the Lab, and at RHIC, there were 1330 visitors. 

It’s not just the visitors that make Summer Sundays the fun yearly events they are. Nearly 300 volunteers help over the four weekends, along with employees who give talks and do hands-on science demonstrations to share their work.  

“I’ve been really impressed with the work done by employees everywhere on-site to prepare for Summer Sundays,” Dorsinvil said. “It requires a whole team of people to get ready for our visitors, and we have a great one here.” 

Brookhaven National Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov.

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