Oak Ridge Today

3-D printed Shelby Cobra highlights ORNL R&D at Detroit Auto Show

Posted at
By 4 Comments

Shelby Cobra 3D Print at ORNL

This Shelby Cobra sports car, 3D-printed at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, will be on display this week at the Detroit Auto Show Technology Showcase. (Photo courtesy ORNL)

 

With a 3-D printed twist on an automotive icon, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory is showcasing additive manufacturing research at the 2015 North American International Auto Show in Detroit.

ORNL’s newest 3-D printed vehicle pays homage to the classic Shelby Cobra in celebration of the racing car’s 50th anniversary. The 3-D printed Shelby will be on display January 12-15 as part of the show’s inaugural Technology Showcase.

Researchers printed the Shelby car at DOE’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL using the Big Area Additive Manufacturing, or BAAM, machine, which can manufacture strong, lightweight composite parts in sizes greater than one cubic meter. The approximately 1,400-pound vehicle contains 500 pounds of printed parts made of 20 percent carbon fiber. [Read more…]

Local cycling community riding this weekend in honor of Biegalski

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Michael Biegalski Memorial Road Ride

A memorial road ride honoring Michael Biegalski, an avid athlete and Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher, started Sunday morning near Whippoorwill Drive and Wisconsin Avenue.

 

Michael Biegalski

Michael Biegalski was an avid athlete and a research and development staff member at the Center for Nanophase Materials Science at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. (Photo courtesy ORNL)

The local cycling community is having memorial rides this weekend in honor of Michael Biegalski, an avid athlete and Oak Ridge National Laboratory researcher who recently died in a tragic mountain biking accident at Haw Ridge.

On Saturday, top athletes from the community rode the North Boundary and Black Oak Ridge trails.

On Sunday, they’re riding the My Larry/Brushy Mountain “prison loop.” It’s a road ride. Like Saturday’s ride, it will depart from the Westwood neighborhood.

The rides are in memory of Michael, who competed in road, mountain, and cyclocross racing and was passionate about big climbs and endurance riding, Amy Biegalski said. [Read more…]

President Obama’s trip to East Tennessee explained

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

President Barack Obama, Sen. Bob Corker, Sen. Lamar Alexander, and Rep. John Duncan at Air Force One

President Barack Obama, front; U.S. senators Lamar Alexander, second, and Bob Corker, third; and Representative John J. Duncan Jr. arrive at McGhee Tyson Airport in Alcoa on Air Force One at about noon Friday. (Photo by Julio Culiat)

 

Before President Obama landed in East Tennessee on Friday, a spokesman explained the purpose of the trip to reporters. The 5.5-hour visit included stops at Pellissippi State Community College in Hardin Valley and manufacturer Techmer PM in Clinton. Senators Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker and Congressman John J. Duncan Jr. were guests, and so was Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam.

Eric Schultz, principal deputy press secretary, told reporters on Air Force One that President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden and his wife Jill would unveil the president’s plan to make two years of community college free for all responsible students no matter their age during the East Tennessee trip. It was a preview of a “cornerstone” of the president’s State of the Union to Congress on January 20.

Separately, during a stop in Clinton, the president announced a manufacturing innovation hub that involves the University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. [Read more…]

Obama visit spotlights sports car printed by UT engineers at ORNL

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Shelby Cobra 3D Printed Cobra

University of Tennessee engineering students Andrew Messing and Alex Roschli printed this Shelby Cobra at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility. The car was on stage during President Obama’s visit to Techmer PM in Clinton on Friday. (Photo courtesy UT)

 

CLINTON—President Obama took the stage at Techmer PM in Clinton on Friday to announce that the University of Tennessee in Knoxville will head a $259 million advanced manufacturing project and that Oak Ridge National Laboratory will play a key role. The president shared the spotlight with a shiny example of innovation, research, and collaboration between the two—a Shelby Cobra 3D printed car.

The car was highlighted during Obama’s visit as an example of the changing world of manufacturing. It was produced with major contributions from a pair of student interns from UT’s College of Engineering—Alex Roschli and Andrew Messing, a press release said.

Roschli and Messing, both seniors in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, are doing internships at ORNL, where the car was printed at the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility. [Read more…]

Knox commissioner, SNS manager to speak at MLK Breakfast in Atomic City

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Sam McKenzie

Sam McKenzie

Knox County Commissioner Sam McKenzie will be the featured speaker at the 27th annual Martin Luther King Fellowship Breakfast.

The breakfast has been organized by the Atomic City Sportsmen. Everyone is welcome to attend. It’s scheduled to start at 8 a.m. Monday, January 19, at the Oak Valley Baptist Church at 194 Hampton Road in Oak Ridge. The breakfast was previously held at the East Tennessee Family Services Building. [Read more…]

Honors: ORNL’s Brady receives TMS Brimacombe Medal

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Michael Brady

Michael Brady

Michael Brady, a researcher at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been selected as one of four recipients to receive The Minerals, Metals, and Materials Society (TMS) 2015 Brimacombe Medalist Award.

The society recognized Brady for his “development of groundbreaking new concepts establishing novel alloy design principles for the control of surface chemistry with widespread applied scientific and engineering impact.” He will be honored at the organization’s annual awards ceremony in March. [Read more…]

Nevada, feds agree to discuss landfill concerns, including ORNL radioactive waste

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

ORNL CEUSP Waste Shipping

Workers train to remove a type of shipping cask that would be used to transport 403 canisters of uranium-tainted waste from Oak Ridge National Laboratory to Nevada National Security Site northwest of Las Vegas. (Photos courtesy U.S. Department of Energy/Office of Environmental Management)

 

A new group of state and federal workers that was announced Tuesday could discuss contentious waste-related issues that include concerns over shipping low-level radioactive waste from a World War II-era building in Oak Ridge to a federal landfill in Nevada.

The new group, which will include senior-level state and federal employees, was announced in a six-page agreement, a memorandum of understanding signed last week by Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval.

The talks started more than a year ago, after Sandoval sent a letter to Moniz expressing concerns over the proposed disposal of the radioactive waste at the Nevada National Security Site, a former nuclear weapons proving ground about 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

CEUSP Canister

At left is an actual 24-inch steel canister. At right is a representation of the canister interior.

The waste contains radioisotopes of uranium from the Consolidated Edison Uranium Solidification Project. It originated from a 1960s research and development test of thorium and uranium reactor fuel in New York. It is stored at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Building 3019—the oldest continuously operating nuclear facility in the Department of Energy complex—in 403 ceramic-like uranium oxide monoliths. Each of the monoliths is bonded to the inside of a steel canister about 3.5 inches in diameter and about two feet long. [Read more…]

DOE works with transuranic waste while NM facility shut down

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

TRU Waste Processing Center

The TRU Waste Processing Center southwest of Oak Ridge National Laboratory off State Route 95 is pictured above. (Photo courtesy TWPC/WAI)

 

Worker Handles Remote TRU Waste

A worker manipulates RH waste at the TRU Waste Processing Center. (Photo courtesy Oak Ridge Site Specific Advisory Board)

In February 2014, two incidents at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, in New Mexico caused the shutdown of the only facility in the U.S. that permanently disposes of transuranic waste, or TRU waste. That waste is disposed in shafts, or drifts, about a half-mile below ground in an ancient salt bed. Some of that waste has come from Oak Ridge.

After months of investigations into the cause of a truck fire and a radiological release two weeks later, the U.S. Department of Energy released a recovery plan at the end of September that outlines the steps necessary to resume limited waste operations in the first quarter of 2016.

“Key elements of the recovery plan include strengthening safety programs, regulatory compliance, decontamination of the underground, increasing ventilation, mine stability and underground habitability, and additional workforce retraining,” according to a statement on WIPP’s website. [Read more…]

Former ORNL employee in inaugural engineering Hall of Fame at UT

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

UT Mabe Hall of Fame

Clockwise from upper left are William Snyder, Richard Rosenberg, Rinehart Bright, and Henry Hartsfield. (Photo courtesy UT)

 

Former chancellor, astronaut also honored

KNOXVILLE—In 1847, a course offering studies in mechanical philosophies and mechanics appeared in what was then East Tennessee University.

Now, almost 170 years later, the school is the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, and the course has grown into the College of Engineering’s Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Biomedical Engineering, or MABE, two-thirds of which would have been considered science fiction to those many years ago.

Now, the department is calling upon that legacy as it prepares to open its Hall of Fame.

The honor of being in the inaugural class belongs to a chancellor, an astronaut, an automotive pioneer, and a person who had a longtime presence in various Oak Ridge facilities. [Read more…]

UT-Battelle donates $100,000 to Children’s Hospital expansion

Posted at
By 1 Comment

Oak Ridge National Laboratory Sign

UT-Battelle has donated $100,000 to the capital campaign for the proposed expansion of East Tennessee Children’s Hospital in Knoxville.

The announcement was made during groundbreaking ceremonies for the expanded facility, a press release said. The planned expansion includes:

  • 250,000 square feet of new space;
  • a new neonatal intensive care unit with private rooms;
  • a new inpatient/outpatient-surgery center;
  • a family lounge and resource center overlooking a rooftop garden;
  • 60,000 square feet of renovated space to include a chapel, laboratory, and a neonatal abstinence syndrome care unit and resource center; and
  • a specialty clinic for diabetes, cleft palate, cystic fibrosis, and healthy ways weight management program.

[Read more…]

Man killed in Haw Ridge accident was skilled biker, valuable ORNL researcher

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Michael Biegalski

Michael Biegalski (Photo courtesy ORNL)

Note: This story was last updated at 12:45 p.m. Dec. 23.

The 38-year-old Oak Ridge man who died in what appears to be an accident while mountain biking on Haw Ridge on Saturday is being remembered as a skilled biker and valuable researcher at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Michael David Biegalski, who was born in Silver Spring, Maryland, had been a research and development staff member at the Center for Nanophase Materials Science at Oak Ridge National Laboratory since 2008 and had worked there from 2006 to 2008 as a postdoctoral research associate.

“He was an incredibly valuable person to the center,” CNMS Director Hans Christen said Monday. “A friend of everybody, extremely helpful.”

Other mountain bikers described Biegalski, who was married with two young daughters, as very skilled, and Christen said he was very competitive and raced. [Read more…]

Paul Langan to lead ORNL’s Neutron Sciences Directorate

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Paul Langan

Paul Langan

Paul Langan, a senior scientist and distinguished research staff member at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been named ORNL’s associate laboratory director for neutron sciences.

Langan will lead the laboratory’s neutron science activities, which include two leading DOE Office of Science user facilities for neutron scattering analysis: the Spallation Neutron Source, or SNS, and the High Flux Isotope Reactor, or HFIR.

“As associate laboratory director, Paul will further broaden our role in neutron sciences globally, expand our instrument capabilities, and prepare for a second target station at the SNS,” ORNL Director Thom Mason said in a press release. [Read more…]