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ORNL employees, UT-Battelle donate $900K+ to nonprofits

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Oak Ridge National Laboratory employees gather on the campus quad for the Facilities and Operations Charity Carnival for Kids and Barbecue Cookoff to benefit East Tennessee Children’s Hospital and St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital on June 23, 2021. (Photo credit: Carlos Jones/ORNL, U.S. Department of Energy)

Oak Ridge National Laboratory employees and the lab’s managing contractor UT-Battelle donated more than $900,000 to local nonprofit organizations in 2021.

Most of the donations, almost $800,000, came from laboratory employees. UT-Battelle provided an additional $144,000 in corporate contributions, a press release said. That’s a total of $944,000 in donations.

The contributions from ORNL’s employees benefit 169 area and regional nonprofits, the press release said.

Organizations receiving funds include:

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Hubbard named deputy for science, technology at ORNL

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Susan Hubbard has been named deputy for science and technology at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo credit: Berkeley Lab)

Susan Hubbard, an acclaimed scientific leader and researcher, has been named deputy for science and technology at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Her appointment will be effective March 1.

“Dr. Hubbard brings skilled and passionate leadership that will enable world-leading impact across our portfolio,” ORNL Director Thomas Zacharia said in a press release. “She is a true champion of the DOE mission, the national laboratory system, and our responsibility to leverage powerful user facilities and multidisciplinary teams in the national interest.”

Hubbard joins ORNL from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where she most recently served as associate laboratory director of Berkeley Lab’s Earth and Environmental Sciences Area, leading efforts to find solutions to sustainably meet the water, energy, critical mineral, environmental quality, and food needs of a growing population, the press release said. In addition to her current role, she is a senior scientist at Berkeley Lab and a full professor adjunct in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at the University of California at Berkeley.

“It is a profound honor and privilege to be named as the deputy for science and technology at ORNL,” Hubbard said. “ORNL has a stunning breadth, depth, and history of transformational fundamental science discoveries, technological advances, and innovative solutions to the most pressing challenges facing our nation. I am thrilled to have the opportunity to help shape the lab’s future and its contributions to the DOE mission.”

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Summit at ORNL still No. 2 supercomputer

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The Summit supercomputer, an IBM system that is the world’s second-most powerful, is pictured above at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy Katie Bethea/ORNL)


 

The Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory remained the fastest system in the United States and the second-most powerful in the world in the biannual TOP500 list released Monday.

Fugaku in Kobe, Japan, remained No. 1, where it has been since June 2020. The 442-petaflop system has been at the top of the list four consecutive times.

Summit, an IBM system, was the world’s most powerful supercomputer from June 2018 to November 2019, when the U.S. Department of Energy had the two fastest systems in the world. DOE still has the second and third most powerful supercomputers, Summit at number two and Sierra at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California at number three.

Fugaku is installed at the Riken Center for Computational Science. It was co-developed by Riken and Fujitsu, and it has 7,630,848 cores. It is based on Fujitsu’s custom ARM A64FX processor, TOP500 said. Fugaku uses a Fujitsu interconnect known as Tofu D to transfer data between nodes.

TOP500 said Fugaku’s 442-petaflop performance on a benchmark test makes it three times as powerful as Summit, which has 2,414,592 cores. The TOP500 list uses a benchmark test to rank the world’s most powerful supercomputers.

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The Summit supercomputer, an IBM system that is the world’s second-most powerful, is pictured above at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy Katie Bethea/ORNL)


 

The Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory remained the fastest system in the United States and the second-most powerful in the world in the biannual TOP500 list released Monday.

Fugaku in Kobe, Japan, remained No. 1, where it has been since June 2020. The 442-petaflop system has been at the top of the list four consecutive times.

Summit, an IBM system, was the world’s most powerful supercomputer from June 2018 to November 2019, when the U.S. Department of Energy had the two fastest systems in the world. DOE still has the second and third most powerful supercomputers, Summit at number two and Sierra at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California at number three.

Fugaku is installed at the Riken Center for Computational Science. It was co-developed by Riken and Fujitsu, and it has 7,630,848 cores. It is based on Fujitsu’s custom ARM A64FX processor, TOP500 said. Fugaku uses a Fujitsu interconnect known as Tofu D to transfer data between nodes.

TOP500 said Fugaku’s 442-petaflop performance on a benchmark test makes it three times as powerful as Summit, which has 2,414,592 cores. The TOP500 list uses a benchmark test to rank the world’s most powerful supercomputers.

The rest of this story is available if you are a member: a subscriber, advertiser, or contributor to Oak Ridge Today. Already a member? Great! Thank you! Sign in here. Not a member? No problem! Subscribe here: Basic

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ORNL will require COVID-19 vaccinations

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The main entrance at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy ORNL)


  Oak Ridge National Laboratory will require all staff members to have a current COVID-19 vaccination by October 15, and new employees will be required to provide proof that they have been vaccinated.

UT-Battelle LLC, which manages the laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy, decided to require vaccinations after the Food and Drug Administration approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine on Monday, August 23.

The rest of this story is available if you are a member: a subscriber, advertiser, or contributor to Oak Ridge Today. Already a member? Great! Thank you! Sign in here. Not a member? No problem! Subscribe here: Basic

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Summit at ORNL remains No. 2 in world

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The Summit supercomputer, a 200-petaflop IBM system that is the world’s second most powerful, is pictured above at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy Katie Bethea/ORNL)

The Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory remains the fastest supercomputer in the United States and the second most powerful in the world.

Summit, an IBM system, was the world’s most powerful supercomputer from June 2018 to November 2019, when the U.S. Department of Energy had the two fastest systems in the world.

DOE still has two of the three fastest supercomputers, Summit at ORNL and Sierra at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. And it has three of the top five systems in the world. DOE has a new supercomputer, Perlmutter, ranked at number five. It’s at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, in Berkeley, California. Perlmutter was the only new system in the top 10 in the semiannual TOP500 list released Monday.

Summit was bumped from the top spot on the TOP500 list by a Japanese supercomputer, Fugaku, in June 2020.

Fugaku, which is in Kobe, Japan, remained in the top spot on the TOP500 list released in November and again on the list released Monday. The TOP500 list uses a benchmark test to rank the world’s most powerful supercomputers.

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Demolition work at ORNL radioisotope lab could be complete this spring

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A view of the demolition of a hot cell inside a protective cover at the former Radioisotope Development Lab at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy UCOR)

Demolition work at a former radioisotope laboratory in Oak Ridge could be complete this spring.

The U.S. Department of Energy Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management and UCOR announced earlier this year that UCOR, a contractor, had begun removing the two remaining structures at the former Radioisotope Development Lab at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

“This project launches our next phase of major demolition and cleanup at ORNL,” said Nathan Felosi, OREM’s portfolio federal project director for ORNL. “Our work is eliminating contaminated structures, like this one, that are on DOE’s list of high-risk facilities and clearing space for future research missions.”

Known as “hot cells,” the structures being demolished are heavily shielded concrete rooms that provided researchers protection from highly radioactive material during the years the laboratory was operational, a press release said.

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ORNL names operations deputy

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Alan Icenhour has been named deputy for operations at ORNL. (Photo credit: Oak Ridge National Laboratory/U.S. Department of Energy)

Alan Icenhour has been named deputy for operations at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He will succeed Jeff Smith, who is retiring this spring after serving in the role since UT-Battelle began operating the lab in 2000, a press release said.

Icenhour joined ORNL in 1990 as an engineer, and he served most recently as associate laboratory director for the Isotope Science and Engineering Directorate. He led the Nuclear Science and Engineering Directorate from 2014 until the isotopes directorate was formed in October 2020. Icenhour has held a variety of other leadership positions as well as an assignment as senior technical adviser to the National Nuclear Security Administration, the press release said.

“Alan is a disciplined, thoughtful leader with broad experience at ORNL and proven success in a variety of roles,” ORNL Director Thomas Zacharia said in the press release said. “His ability to evaluate complex problems, find creative solutions, and build highly productive relationships will ensure the operational excellence necessary to support world-leading research and development.”

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Hear from ORNL scientists who worked on Perseverance mission

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Video published on YouTube by Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Three scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory will discuss their work this afternoon on technologies for the Perseverance rover, which uses plutonium-238 produced at the lab and will touch down on Mars on Thursday.

Perseverance is scheduled to make its final descent into Jezero Crater on the surface of Mars on Thursday. It’s the first NASA mission that uses plutonium-238 produced at ORNL.

The plutonium-238 is encased in iridium-alloy cladding, and it is insulated by carbon-bonded carbon fiber. It’s used in the heat source module that fuels Perseverance’s multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator. As the plutonium decays, the heat that is released is converted into electricity, charging the rover’s batteries and powering the onboard advanced imaging and sensor systems. (Learn more about the Mars mission here.)

The online event today featuring the three ORNL scientists is hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy, and it is scheduled to start at 3 p.m.

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Japanese supercomputer displaces ORNL’s Summit as world’s most powerful

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A Japanese supercomputer has displaced the Summit supercomputer, pictured above at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, as the world’s most powerful. Summit is a 200-petaflop IBM system. (Photo courtesy Katie Bethea/ORNL)

Note: This story was last updated at 3 p.m. June 24.

A Japanese supercomputer has displaced the Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as the world’s most powerful and bumped other U.S. and Chinese machines down one spot on a semiannual list of the fastest systems.

Summit had been ranked the world’s most powerful supercomputer on the semiannual TOP500 list since June 2018. It was bumped to number two when the new TOP500 list was released Monday.

The new top system is installed in Kobe, Japan, and it is named Fugaku. In a high-performance test, it performed at 415.5 petaflops. A petaflop is a quadrillion floating-point operations per second.

Fugaku’s performance was 2.8 times better than Summit’s, according to TOP500. Summit delivered 148.8 petaflops on the high-performance test.

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For members: ORNL contract extension valued at up to $8 billion

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The five-year non-competitive contract extension at Oak Ridge National Laboratory has an estimated value of up to $8 billion, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

The DOE Office of Science has explained why it did not have a full, open competition for the extension.

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Work starts to increase power of SNS proton beam

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Construction work has started on a part of a project to double the power of the proton beam in the Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. It’s the first construction work at SNS since 2006. (Photo courtesy ORNL)

Construction work has started on a part of a project to double the power of the proton beam in the Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

It’s the first construction work at the $1.4 billion SNS since 2006.

The current work is limited to what is known as the klystron gallery. It houses radio-frequency systems. They power the structures that are used to accelerate a negatively-charged hydrogen ion beam in the linear accelerator at SNS.

ORNL has previously said the klystron gallery construction could last about one year.

The work is part of a project called the proton power upgrade, or PPU. It will eventually double the power of the SNS proton beam from 1.4 megawatts to 2.8 megawatts. That could be a seven-year project. The potential cost has previously been estimated at $245 million.

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ORNL making molds to help produce COVID-19 test tubes

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An example of a 3D printer, the Cincinnati Machine, is pictured above at work in Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility in Hardin Valley on Dec. 29, 2014. (Photo courtesy of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Dept. of Energy)

Engineers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory are making metal molds that companies will use to manufacture plastic tubes for COVID-19 test kits.

The work has been cited in two federal coronavirus task force press conferences at the White House this week.

On Monday, Brad Smith, a federal health official, said the ORNL work could help supply more than 40 million collection tubes per month in the next several weeks. Smith grew up in Knoxville, and he has been a business leader and entrepreneur, and served in Tennessee state government. He is now deputy administrator and director of the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The ORNL work was also cited by President Donald Trump on Sunday.

The ORNL engineers are using additive manufacturing to produce the metal molds for the COVID-19 test kits. Additive manufacturing is the process of making an object by printing it with a material layer by layer. Printers known as 3D printers— some large, some small—can be used.

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