Steve Zinkle
KNOXVILLE—Steve Zinkle, an authority on the effect of radiation on materials in fission and fusion nuclear reactors, has been named the thirteenth University of Tennessee–Oak Ridge National Laboratory Governor’s Chair.
Zinkle will serve as Governor’s Chair for Nuclear Materials, based in the department of nuclear engineering at UT with a complementary appointment in materials science and engineering. He begins at UT on Oct. 1. [Read more…]
Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Neutron Sciences Directorate, or NScD, home organization for the Spallation Neutron Source and High Flux Isotope Reactor, has filled two high-level administrative positions with leaders in the neutron scattering field.
Rob McQueeney, recently with Iowa State University and Ames Laboratory, has been named NScD’s deputy associate laboratory director. Alan Tennant, currently with the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin in Germany, has been named chief scientist for the NScD. [Read more…]
Oak Ridge National Laboratory volunteers receive the Horizon Award from the Tennessee Labor Management Foundation. From left are Angela Gaylon, Dale McBee, Steve Jones, Mike Day, team captain Ann Weaver, and Jeff Reasor. (Submitted photo)
Team UT-Battelle’s all-volunteer project to build homes for Aid to Distressed Families of Appalachian Counties has earned the 2013 Horizon Award from the Tennessee Labor Management Foundation.
The award, which recognizes labor management partnerships that benefit the Tennessee community, will be presented to UT-Battelle and the Atomic Trades and Labor Council at the foundation’s summer conference in Nashville. UT-Battelle is the managing contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. [Read more…]
A free concert and rally in Knoxville at noon Saturday features Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientist Virginia Dale, right, and a new “Climate Reality” show by Al Gore. (Submitted image)
A free “One Earth, Our Choice” concert and rally today (Saturday) features an Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientist who will discuss Tennessee’s changing climate and a presentation of Al Gore’s new show, “The Climate Reality Project.”
The concert and rally for climate action starts at noon at SEEED at 1617 Dandridge Ave. in Knoxville, a press release said.
It’s part of a weekend of events that includes climate activist Bill McKibben speaking at Oak Ridge High School on Sunday and at Thompson-Boling Arena on Monday. Organizers called it an “attention-getting weekend for climate action.” Those involved in today’s concert and rally include Secret City Sustainability, a student-led initiative in Oak Ridge.
The ability to control nanoscale imperfections in superconducting wires results in materials with unparalleled and customized performance, according to a new study from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
Applications for superconducting wires, which carry electricity without resistance when cooled to a critical temperature, include underground transmission cables, transformers, and large-scale motors and generators. But these applications require wires to operate under different temperature and magnetic field regimes. [Read more…]
This figure shows the spectroscopic measurement (current as a function of voltage) and this as a function of temperature. (Reproduced by permission of The Royal Society of Chemistry)
Better batteries, catalysts, electronic information storage and processing devices are among potential benefits of an unexpected discovery made by Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists using samples isolated from the atmosphere.
Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy lab learned that key surface properties of complex oxide films are unaffected by reduced levels of oxygen during fabrication—an unanticipated finding with possible implications for the design of functional complex oxides used in a variety of consumer products, said Zheng Gai, a member of DOE’s Center for Nanoscale Materials Sciences at ORNL.
The findings are detailed in a paper published in Nanoscale. [Read more…]
Jeff Nichols
A leader in high-performance computing at Oak Ridge National Laboratory will be the featured speaker at the monthly meeting of Friends of ORNL.
Jeff Nichols is associate laboratory director for ORNL’s Computing and Computational Sciences Directorate. Nichols leads the laboratory’s advanced high-performance computing in priority areas such as climate change, nuclear energy, fusion energy, nanotechnology, and biotechnology, a press release said. [Read more…]
From left, Dot Harris, director of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Economic Impact and Diversity, and Michael Colbert, deputy director of DOE’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, listen as Research Alliance in Math and Science student Darius Degraffenried presents his research. (Photo by ORNL’s Jason Richards)
The U.S. Department of Energy’s Dot Harris, director of the Office of Economic Impact and Diversity, visited Oak Ridge National Laboratory Thursday and Friday.
Harris spoke at the Research Alliance in Math and Science banquet Thursday evening, and she attended a RAMS poster session that preceded the dinner.
Her agenda also included visits to ORNL’s supercomputing facilities, Spallation Neutron Source, the Carbon Fiber Technology Facility, and the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility, as well as discussions on the lab’s education, outreach, partnerships, and small business programs. [Read more…]
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher A.C. Buchanan III has been elected a fellow of the American Chemical Society.
Buchanan, a member of ORNL’s Chemical Sciences Division, was recognized for his contributions to the fundamental understanding of the thermochemical transformations of fossil and renewable fuels. [Read more…]
Matt Feldman of Oak Ridge National Laboratory has been elected fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, or ASME.
He was elected for his outstanding engineering achievements, a press release said. AMSE fellows are peer-nominated and chosen by the ASME board of governors.
Feldman works in the Nuclear Security and Isotope Technology Division at ORNL.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers are learning more about the microbial processes
that convert elemental mercury into methylmercury. (Submitted image)
More forms of mercury can be converted to deadly methylmercury than previously thought, according to a study published Sunday in Nature Geoscience. The discovery provides scientists with another piece of the mercury puzzle, bringing them one step closer to understanding the challenges associated with mercury cleanup.
Earlier this year, a multidisciplinary team of researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory discovered two key genes that are essential for microbes to convert oxidized mercury to methylmercury, a neurotoxin that can penetrate skin and at high doses affect brain and muscle tissue, causing paralysis and brain damage.
The discovery of how methylmercury is formed answered a question that had stumped scientists for decades, and the findings published this week build on that breakthrough. [Read more…]
Robert Jubin
Robert Jubin of Oak Ridge National Laboratory has received the 2013 Robert E. Wilson Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, or AIChE.
The AIChE recognized Jubin’s contributions in the areas of nuclear fuel reprocessing and radioactive waste treatment, and his chemical engineering achievements in the nuclear industry.
Jubin works in ORNL’s Nuclear Security and Isotope Technology Division.
