Some facts about the Y-12 National Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (Unless otherwise noted, these facts come from the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance's data) Here's what's going on in Oak Ridge: * upgrading nuclear warheads with newly manufactured parts, lengthening the warhead's shelf life from 30 years to 100 years. 10 warheads are put into an MX missile with a subassembly that changes the reaction to a thermonuclear one. Oak Ridge is the only place in the country responsible for this subassembly which makes an atomic bomb thermonuclear. One MX missile has the destructive capability of 100,000 Hiroshima bombs. * turning existing weapons into "low yield" or "mini-nukes". In 1994, Congress banned any new research or development of this type of weapon. The defense industry evidently is trying to get around this by saying they are only repackaging existing weapons. Mini-nukes are intended to penetrate underground bunkers, and according to information distributed by OREPA, are "considered usable in cities with 'minimal collateral damage'." The largest mini-nuke yield is equal to 5,000 tons of TNT with a one-mile-wide blast. A Hiroshima size burst would equal a ground blast circle of one and a half miles wide. * according to an article by CNN writer Richard Stenger, microbiologists at Y-12 have "cemented genetically modified bacteria to microchips, creating an innovative way to clean up dangerous chemicals. The hybrid includes genetic material from a luminscent aquatic microorganism and another bacteria that breaks down pollutants into simpler, safer compounds. Affixed to microcircuits with latex and other polymers, the so-called 'critters on a chip' eat harmful toxins, emit a blue green light, and then can transmit a signal to a receiver linked to a remote computer...Amid the fanfare over possible medical benefits, critics wonder if the biotech hybrids might lead to Frankenstein-like outcomes". I think that this should also be taken into context with other cyborg development being done around the country. Stenger also reports that "In Chicago, researchers have fused the brain of a  primitive lamprey eel with a robot the size of a hockey puck, creating a living machine that tracks a beam of light" and "Part biological and part mechanical, the crude cyborg is equipped with the brain stem of an eel, which, kept alive in a saline solution, receives input from electronic light sensors and directs the robotic wheels to move toward the source of the beam. The cyborg eel is only one member of a menagerie of animal/machine hybrids that relies on sophisticated microelectronics. In other projects in the United States, monkey brains have been wired to control robotic appendages, moth antennae have been used to sniff out explosives, and bacteria have been engineered to glow in the presence of environmental toxins."