A hotchpotch set of grey and white buildings huddled in fields outside Vienna may seem an unlikely setting for a laboratory which could help uncover illicit nuclear activity. This is where International Atomic Energy Agency experts magnify, scour and dissolve hundreds of samples taken from nuclear sites world-wide each year to verify whether activities are peaceful by checking for the microscopic clues that could point to undeclared atomic work.
The UN watchdog expects its inspectors will be able to bring back such environmental swab samples from their first visit to Iran's planned uranium enrichment site near the holy city of Qom on October 25, according to a diplomat close to the IAEA. Iran says the facility, which it hid until last month, is aimed at refining uranium for energy purposes only and that no nuclear material has been introduced yet.
Western powers suspect Iran's atomic programme is a veiled quest to develop bombs and some diplomats have questioned the month-long delay until Iran opens the site, fearing it may use this to remove suspicious evidence. The IAEA's Seibersdorf complex, which has mushroomed since 1962 like a jumbled university campus close to Vienna, could help provide some answers.
Seibersdorf gained a prominent verification role in the 1990s after the first Gulf War when the agency was given wider powers to detect secret atomic work following the discovery of Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme. Officials say their experience with Iraq helped them hone techniques to detect concealed nuclear activity, as well as cut through the political debate.
"The key (with Iraq) was the samples. No matter what people say, the samples don't lie. The truth will come out," said IAEA unit head David Donohue, clad in cotton slippers to keep dust from his shoes contaminating his spotless white "clean lab". Here, scientists in head-to-toe body suits pore over dust samples with microscopes, looking for particles as small as a trillionth of a gram which can help the IAEA verify whether a member state is telling all on its nuclear programme.
IRREPLACABLE: Among other substances, the 42-person Seibersdorf analytical team is looking for traces of uranium and plutonium purified to the high level that forms the core of atom bombs. The samples can uncover past and current nuclear activities, particularly those linked to conversion of uranium ore into processed material, subsequent enrichment and finally fabrication into fuel pellets.
To ensure impartial assessment of evidence, Seibersdorf staff are not told where samples come from, all evidence is barcoded and can only be identified by senior officials drawing up reports at IAEA headquarters in Vienna. "I consider these swipes to be priceless," Donohue said, removing a small cotton square from a sterile, ziplocked plastic bag kit which the agency makes for around 50-60 euros ($75-90) apiece complete with surgical gloves and note paper. "They are a snapshot of a nuclear facility at one point in time. They are irreplaceable."
The IAEA sends samples to partner laboratories world-wide for more testing to produce "a second opinion". It can compare evidence against a samples archive stretching back over a decade to see if there are hidden links between sites and countries. Most samples, taken during inspections agreed with member states, turn up only normal, declared activity.
UNCOVERING COVER-UPS: The agency can even detect clues when a country has worked hard to get rid of traces. Before an IAEA inspectors' visit in 2003, Iran said that no nuclear material had been introduced at its Kalaye Electric facility in Tehran.
But the IAEA was able to detect traces of highly enriched uranium in samples taken from the site, even though Iran had prevented sample-taking over several months and had used the delay to remove equipment and renovate parts of the facility. The agency concluded that Iran had taken steps to conceal the origin, source and extent of its enrichment programme. Iran later admitted it had tested centrifuges at the site using small amounts of highly enriched uranium.
"Dust is everywhere. It's in the cracks in the floor, it is impossible to clear. However hard you try to clean up you cannot remove 100 percent of the traces," Donohue said. The agency also uses satellite imagery, onsite video surveillance and facility blueprints to vet activities and tell whether atomic material could be diverted from declared plants.
CASH-STRAPPED: But the Seibersdorf laboratories are outdated and underfunded, according to IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei, who in June lashed out at states reluctant to raise the agency budget. "The agency can continue to struggle on with growing restrictions and increasing risk, watching the quality of its services erode," ElBaradei told the IAEA's board of governors. "Or, with adequate funding, it can make an effective contribution to non-proliferation, nuclear security and the scourges of poverty, hunger and disease."
Known mainly as the world's nuclear inspectorate, the agency also promotes atomic security and safety and helps states apply nuclear technology for health, environmental and trade purposes. The Seibersdorf complex also houses billions of flies, bred and irradiated as part of a disease-control programme. It cultivates disease-resistant plants in its hothouses and helps train dozens of scientists a year. But funding is very tight.
After months of haggling, the IAEA's 35-nation board agreed in August to raise the agency's core budget by 5.4 percent to 318.2 million euros for 2010, less than the 11 percent sought by ElBaradei but a net gain after years of zero growth.
Members of the Seibersdorf analytical team, who at times have laboured through the night to file urgent analysis on isotopes and enrichment levels, have worked in temporary cabins because the volume of verification work has expanded so quickly. "(This) is the busiest laboratory in the world when it comes to the processing of nuclear samples. We get about 700-1,000 a year," safeguards laboratory chief Christian Schmitzer said.
"Then there is the analytical burden this generates. A sample does not translate to a single analysis." The IAEA hopes to start rebuilding its nuclear laboratory in 2011 and, with the help of Japan, acquire a 3.6-million-euro mass spectrometer in 2010, a powerful instrument that would improve particle analysis.
The IAEA says it needs to hold on to its ability to make independent checks, especially in politically-sensitive cases, and to spearhead research and training into nuclear applications, rather than relying too heavily on facilities in member states. "It is a question of timeliness, it is a question of independence," said Werner Burkart, head of the IAEA's nuclear sciences and applications department.