Although Keiji Asano was born in the U.S., as was his father, his mother was born in a small town near Fukushima, Japan. His father's side of the family lives in the U.S. while his mother's side of the family (three sets of aunts and uncles and seven cousins) all live in Japan.
Growing up, he and his sister had a strong influence from Japanese culture. They attended Japanese School (on Saturdays) where they learned to read, write, and speak Japanese. His sister also took Japanese Classical Dance lessons. Although Keiji acknowledges that he does not currently participate in any Japanese custom, he still eats the traditional Japanese food at New Years when he visits his parents during the holidays. Keiji has been fortunate to visit his relatives in Japan several times, with the most recent trip being for the occasion of his cousin's wedding. The wedding was a combination of a traditional Buddhist ceremony with a Western style reception, complete with a laser light show.
The opportunity to work in a mass spectrometry group (Organic and Biological Mass Spectrometry Group) was what brought Keiji to East Tennessee and ORNL in 1986. He is a research associate in the Chemical and Analytical Sciences Division and has research interests in gas-phase ion chemistry and applications of GC/MS in forensic chemistry.
Shirin Badlani
India is a land of stupendous dimensions -- colorful, exotic, traditional, modern -- the destination of the nineties. India meets the expectations of all types of people. With her varied topography, picturesque valleys, high mountain peaks and cascading rivers, she never ceases to surprise people with her kaleidoscopic attractions. The pomp and pageantry of India's festivals and local fairs are matched by the warmth and hospitality of her people who welcome other people with open hearts and warm smiles. The shopping scene in India is a journey through centuries embracing old traditional crafts and artistic skills. A land for recreation, adventure and business, India is an interesting amalgamation of tradition and modernity. With its exotic temples, palaces, hotels, beaches and summer resorts, India is one of the most beautiful places to visit.
Of the festivals celebrated in India, one of the biggest is Diwali, which falls between October and November and is believed to be the Indian New Year. The Diwali festival is celebrated with lights, lots of sweets, and large gatherings of relatives dressed in their brightest clothes. Usually a gold coin or a gold ornament is bought on that day.
Arranged marriages are an Indian custom. The parents select a spouse for their child when their children are about 20 to 22 years old. In most cases the children are given a choice of spouses to select from. The marriage ceremony is done in great style and takes from one to two hours. The bride wears a red sari with a big red dot on the forehead which is a sign of marriage. The festivities go on for about a week. Shirin's wedding picture is on the Pictures page.
A traditional greeting in India involves folding your hands together and saying Namaste which means hello in Hindi -- India's primary language.
Shirin Badlani was born in the city of Agra, located in the northern part of India and home to the famous Taj Mahal.
Shirin and her husband, Suresh, moved to Knoxville in 1981. They were drawn to East Tennessee because of a job opportunity for Suresh and quickly fell in love with the area. The decision to raise their family and make plans to eventually retire in East Tennessee was easily reached. In 1989, Shirin accepted a secretarial position at ORNL. She currently works for the Irradiated Materials Examination & Testing Facility in the Metals & Ceramics Division. Shirin and Suresh live in West Knoxville with their two children, daughter, Monica and son, Amman.
The Chinese New Year Celebration is one of the customs John Bui remembers fondly from his early childhood. In particular, John recalls the family gatherings and the tradition of the younger members of the family telling the older generation to have a long life and long health. In turn, the youngsters would receive money in a beautifully decorated red envelope. John Quang Bui was born in Saigon. At the age of eight or nine years old John's family had to flee their country because of the outcome of the Vietnam War and the onset of the communist rule. Fortunately, John's grandfather, who was a Chief in Saigon, was able to buy tickets for the family to leave the country. John's father, however, had to stay behind because he was a member of the Vietnamese Air Force and was forbidden to leave the country. Finally, in 1975, John's father was reunited with his family in the United States. John grew up in Indiana where he attended Indiana University. Later, he moved to Knoxville where he graduated from ITT as an Electrical Engineer. Before coming to ORNL, John worked for Motorola for six years. Currently, he is a personal computer technician in the Instrumentation and Controls Division on loan to the Metals and Ceramics Division. John lives in Knoxville with his wife, Linda, and their two adorable sons, Tanner and Conner. There are some pictures of John's wife and sons on the Pictures page.
Lisa Chiang was born in Hong Kong. She and her bother, Joel, became orphans. When Lisa was almost three and Joel nearly two, they were adopted by a couple of Chinese and Japanese descent. The couple had the children flown from Hong Kong to Montreal, Canada, where they were living. Although Joel could not walk when he was first adopted due to illness, he is well now and has become a successful engineer testing large trucks for Freightliner.
Lisa's adopted father is Chinese, being born in Mainland China, and educated there until the Japanese invasion. At that time he fled overseas to continue his education, leaving many relatives in Mainland China, mainly near Chengdu. After immigrating to Canada, he obtained a Master's degree from the University of Toronto and then later obtained his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Wisconsin. Her adopted mother is Canadian Japanese, born on the West Coast of Canada. Her mother's family was forced to relocate to interior Canada during World War II. Although the war was hard on her mother's family (causing the loss of their fishing boats), it did open for the first time opportunities in many other professions that were previously closed to people of Japanese descent. Her mother got her undergraduate and Master's degree in education and became a teacher.
Until the age of five, Lisa's family lived in Quebec. They then emigrated to the U.S. when Quebec decided to make French their official language since her father did not feel he could learn French adequately. Lisa pursued her education and graduated with a BSEE from the University of Pittsburgh in 1983 and worked as an electrical engineer until 1996. She then attended night school in pursuit of her Master's degree in physics from the University of Utah. It was at that time that she met her husband, Rick Oberer. Both then decided to pursue their Ph.D's and were accepted at Georgia Tech in the Health Physics/Radiological Engineering/Nuclear Engineering program in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Lisa came to ORNL through a student co-op program through ORISE to work in the Advanced Nuclear Measurements group of the Measurement and Science section of the Instrumentation and Controls Division. Her work involves using fast neutron detectors coupled with a neutron source to assay fissile materials.
Although for the most part Lisa is Americanized, she and her husband (a Caucasian American) take off their shoes before entering the house. Lisa also enjoys eating oriental food: Korean, Chinese, Japanese, and Vietnamese. Lisa has proved some interesting pictures of rural China.
Ashok Choudhury was born and raised in Jamshedpur, India; an industrial city not too distant from Calcutta. His parents and the majority of his maternal family still reside in Jamshedpur. His paternal ancestors hail from Bengal and his paternal relatives still reside in the ancestral homeplace which is over 200 years old. Ashok came to The University of Tennessee in Knoxville in 1980 to pursue graduate studies in Metallurgical Engineering. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California at Davis after which he joined the research staff at ORNL's M&C Division. Currently, he is a Licensing Executive at ORNL's Office of Technology Transfer where his primary job is licensing ORNL technologies. He has been recognized for his work in Technology Transfer at ORNL's Awards Night in 1996 and 1999. Ashok is a member of the Hindu Community Center of Knoxville. He and his family currently reside in Oak Ridge. Ashok is trying to teach his daughters Bengali, his mother tongue, and enjoys fishing in the lakes of East Tennessee.
Patricia (Pat) Hu of the Energy Division was born in Pingtung, located in the southern part of Taiwan. She lives in Oak Ridge with her husband (Russ Lee), two sons, and her parents. Russ Lee heads the Center for Energy and Environmental Analysis of the Energy Division. Pat's sons attend the Oak Ridge schools. At home, they celebrate the major Chinese holidays such as Chinese New Year and the Moon festival.
Pat came to ORNL to join her husband and currently manages the Statistics and Data Analysis Program in the Center for Transportation Analysis. She is an appointed member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the international journal Accident Analysis & Prevention, the Expert Task Group on Long-Term Pavement Performance of the National Research Council's Transportation Research Board (TRB),an expert panel of the National Cooperative Highway Research Program, and five technical committees of the National Research Council's Transportation Research Board. She was awarded the
Pyke Johnson Award from the National Research Council's TRB for the outstanding paper in the field of transportation planning and administration in 1984, was a Martin Marietta Energy Systems Corporate Honoree (in Science and Technology) for YWCA's "Tribute to Women" in 1990, received a merit award in technical reports given by the East Tennessee Chapter of the Society for Technical Communication in 1995; was awarded a Lockheed Martin Significant Event Award in 1996; and received the Distinguished Technology Achievement Award given by the Association for Women in Science in 1997.
Bernadette Kirk, born in Bacolor, Pampanga, Philippines, comes from a family of seven children. All her brothers and sisters live in the Philippines. As a Fulbright-Hays grantee she was encouraged to apply to universities of interest to her. Since she does not like the frozen zones, she chose Tennessee. She is currently performing work at ORNL as a group leader in the Radiation Safety Information Computational Center of the Computational Physics and Engineering Division. In 1998 she received the American Nuclear Society's Women's Achievement Award. In her spare time she enjoys raising German shepherds and weightlifting.
Bernadette's hometown of Bacolor, Pampanga, former Capital of the Philippines, was devastated in 1995 by the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo. The entire town was buried in lava and has had to rebuild. A picture of San Guillermo Parish Church before and after the eruption shows the many feet of lava that settled, leaving only the top portion of the church accessible. Click here to see pictures of the eruption of Mt. Pinetubo in 1995.
Elena Koontz was born in Manila, Philippines. She received her B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the Universidad de Santo Thomas in Manila. She was then awarded a graduate scholarship from Virginia Polytechnic Institute in Blacksburg, Virginia, where she received her M.S. in Chemical Engineering. She and her husband, John, enjoy the beauty of East Tennessee and moved here when he received a teaching position at the University of Tennessee's Biochemistry, Cellular, and Molecular Biology Department (BCMB). He is currently the department head of BCMB. Their son, Jason, is pursuing his M.D./Ph.D. with a scholarship at Harvard Medical School in Boston. Elena's oldest sister is still living in Manila and has children with their own businesses in Manila. Her brother and four other sisters are living in the United States with careers in internal medicine, pharmacy, architecture, and business administration.
Elena first came to work in Oak Ridge as a FORTRAN programmer in the area of Uranium Enrichment. She is currently performing engineering software development in the Engineering Analysis Group of the Computational Physics and Engineering Division. She has developed programs in a variety of computer languages, including Visual Basic, C, Java, and FORTRAN.
Elena still enjoys getting together with other Filipinos for celebrations and has previously served as Vice President of the East Tennessee Philippine/American Association. Another strong influence in her life is her faith that she practices through Catholicism. Elena provided a picture of the road to Baguio, Philippines.
HT Lin was born in Taiwan where he has fond memories of celebrating the Chinese New Year, the Lantern Festival, the Dragon Boat Festival, and the Mid-Autumn Festival. In 1987, HT and his wife, Mei-Ling moved to Oak Ridge so that HT could complete his Ph.D. dissertation in the Metals and Ceramics Division at ORNL. He and Mei-Ling currently live in Oak Ridge with their son Albert who is 11 years old, and their daughter Ashley, who is 9 years old. HT provided us with a cute picture of his daughter in the part in his hometown and a picture of the San Hsia Temple in Taiwan.
HT is a research staff member in the Structural Ceramics Group in the M&C Division. He is currently the principal investigator for two projects in the group; "Component Verification"(DOE Office of Industrial Technologies, Microturbine Technology Program) and "Time-Dependent Behavior" (Office of Industrial Technologies, CFCC Program). In this capacity, HT has won a number of awards, including: the Science and Technology Agency (STA) Fellowship Award from Japan Science and Technology Cooperation, 1998, in recognition for the leadership and accomplishment in high-temperature mechanical behavior of ceramics and ceramic composites; the Lockheed Martin Energy Research Significant Event Award, 1997, in recognition for the outstanding technical contribution to the Office of Industrial Technologies, Advanced Turbine System (ATS) Program; the Martin Marietta Energy Systems Technical Support Awards for Technology Transfer for 1996 and 1993, in recognition for the outstanding technical contribution for "whisker-toughened ceramic composite technology" transfer; and the Martin Marietta Energy Systems Technical Achievement Award for 1991, in recognition for the outstanding contribution to the development of fundamental understanding of the toughening mechanisms of brittle ceramics. While still a student, HT received the U.S. DOE Postgraduate Research Program Award, 1989; and was honored as one of the 10 Most Outstanding Graduate Students of Auburn University, in recognition of outstanding academic, scholarly, and service accomplishments, 1989.
J. Winston Lue was born in Taipei, Taiwan. He is fourth in the birth order of his family of nine children - four boys and five girls. Five of his brothers and sisters still live in Taiwan, with the remainder living in the United States. Six of the nine children are college graduates, including three with a Ph.D. Winston obtained a B.S. in Physics from Taiwan Normal University in 1964, a M.S. in Nuclear Physics from Tsinghwa University in 1967, and a Ph.D. in Solid State Physics from the University of Pittsburgh in 1972.
The scenic terrain, beautiful weather, kind people, and prestige of working at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory attracted Winston to East Tennessee. He joined the Fusion Energy Division in 1975 and continues performing research there on the development of high-temperature superconductor applications for the power industry. In particular, he has worked on a CRADA project with Southwire Company to develop high-temperature superconducting transmission cables for the past three years. The team working on this CRADA has just received a Significant Event Award from the Laboratory.
While in his home, he and his wife still communicate in Taiwanese most of the time. There is a Taiwanese Association of America, East Tennessee Chapter, in Oak Ridge. They get together about once every two months to celebrate Taiwanese festivals, sing Taiwanese folk songs, etc.
Vince C. Mei is a research engineer in thermal science working in the Energy Division. He was born in Shanghai, but grew up in Taiwan and came to this part of the world about 30 years ago to continue his graduate studies in mechanical engineering. Vince's wife, Saio, is currently working part time at Comstock, Inc. as an accountant and his son, Matthew, will graduate from Oak Ridge High School this summer. Matthew will continue his education at Harvard University. The Mei family is active in the Knoxville Chinese Christian Church where Vince was a deacon for 8 years and Saio teaches Chinese. Vince was the past principal of the Knoxville Chinese School and Saio had been a teacher there for many years.
The Mei family speaks mostly Chinese at home. Matthew is a bi-lingual person (he is also very good in Spanish, finishing first in the Tennessee State Spanish Test this year). They all like to eat Chinese food daily.
Vince has been at ORNL since 1979. He holds 5 patents, has authored 76 technical publications, and ad been co-editor of six volumes of the Heat Pump Symposium published by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. In addition he has received a Martin Marietta Energy System Awards Night Medal, an Inventor's International Hall of Fame's "Advanced Technology Award", an Honor Certificate from Taiwan's Overseas Chinese Bureau for serving local Chinese community as the principal of the Knoxville Chinese School, and in 1998, received a Lockheed Martin Significant Event Award.
Mala Pasupathi is the finance officer in the Computer Science and Mathematics Division. She is a Certified Public Accountant. She began her employment at ORNL in 1993 after previously working for the Accounting Firm of Cooper's and Lybrand in Pittsburgh, Penn. She and her husband, Srinath Viswanathan, who is a research scientist in the Metals and Ceramics Division, reside in Knoxville. Mala has a second profession—performing Indian classical dance called Bharathanatyam.. She started learning Indian classical dance at a very young age and has performed extensively around the world Besides solo performances. She has also choreographed dance dramas and has presented lectures and seminar on the subject. Mala has also studied Indian classical music called Carnatic music under distinguished teachers in India and is an accomplished singer. (For more information on Mala's dance profession, click her picture.)
Dr. Thomas Thundat is a senior scientist and group leader of the Nanoscale Science and Devices Group in the Life Sciences Division. He was born in Cochin, India; is married; and has two daughters, Rachel 5 and Tess 1-1/2. They enjoy native customs such as Indian food, Malayalam language, and music. Dr. Thundat has been the recipient of many awards such as: National Merit Scholarship; Outstanding Teaching Assistant Award, State University of New York; Martin-Marietta Energy Systems Significant Event Award (1994); Lockheed Martin Inventor's Award (1996); Lockheed Martin Publication Award (1996); Health & Safety Research Division Excellence in Research Award (1995); Inventor's Hall of Fame Advanced Technology Award (1996); R&D 100 Award (1996); U.S. Department of Energy Young Scientist Award (1996); Lockheed Martin Publication Award (1997); Lockheed Martin R &D Accomplishment Award (1997); AMSE Emerging Technology Award (1997); Lockheed Martin R&D Accomplishment Award (1998); Discovery Award finalist (1998).
Chin-Chi (Jim) Tsai was born in Taiwan, a small island (50 miles wide and 200 miles long) about one-fifth the size of Tennessee with a population of over 21 million. Jim is one of 12 children in his family. Many of his relatives still live in Taiwan. Since it takes 30 hours to travel by plane from Oak Ridge to Taiwan, he chooses to visit his homeland once every four or five years. He and his wife moved to Oak Ridge from Ontario, Canada, in 1974. They enjoy living with the friendly people of Oak Ridge and in the beautiful environment and weather of Tennessee. His son and daughter grew up in Oak Ridge.
At ORNL Jim was offered the unique opportunity for pursuing his career in the research and development of plasma science and technology. Working with neutral beam team members, he is very happy to have had the opportunity to develop reliable multi-mega-watt neutral beam injectors and ion sources for heating fusion plasmas to world-record temperatures of over 100 million degrees. He is currently working on technology and scientific applications for the SNS mercury target team and on fusion plasma heating. He has had many opportunities to collaborate with research staff throughout the U.S. and abroad. Jim has been issued two patents for his work in plasma process and several performance awards.
Jim continues to practice some of the customs of his culture. In the mornings he performs Tai Chi, a form of martial arts exercise. The daily 30-minute exercise keeps him in good health. His family also celebrates the Chinese New Year and the Moon-Cake Festival. Usually they have a party or picnic to enjoy delicious Chinese foods. This year was the year of the Rabbit. Traditionally, children are given money for the New Year wrapped in red paper for "good luck." The Moon-Cake Festival (on August 15 of the lunar calendar), also known as Mid-Autumn Festival or Harvest, is celebrated as a time for family reunions and to appreciate the moon and eat moon cakes. This custom of eating moon cake was started about 1100 years ago. The moon cake is traditionally made in the shape of a full moon, symbolizing union and perfection. An interesting story in connection with this celebration is told regarding the overthrow of the Mongolian Empire in the 14th Century. The crafty Zhu Yuan Zhang, founder of the Ming dynasty, instigated a rebellion against Mongol rulers by concealing a call to revolt in moon cakes, leading to the downfall of Mongol.
Jy-An Wang was born and reared in Taiwan, Republic of China, and was the oldest of four children. One of his brothers lives in Taiwan, as do his parents for part of every year. His parents emigrated from Mainland China to Taiwan in the 1940s during the Chinese civil war between the Nationalist and Communist Parties.
Jy-An came to the United States in July 1979. He is married and has three sons. Many factors contributed to his desire to move to East Tennessee. He lived in Raleigh, North Carolina, for one semester and was somewhat familiar with living in the South. The Great Smoky Mountain National Park was also a big plus. With the Oak Ridge school system having a good reputation and the size of the community being small, yet diverse, multi-cultural, and well educated, Oak Ridge seemed to be a friendly and welcoming place to live. Since he had always thought highly of the work performed at the National Laboratories throughout the country, he felt proud and happy to be able to work at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He is currently performing research on issues relating to integrity of reactor pressure vessels in the Computational Physics and Engineering Division. Jy-An was recognized in Marquis Who's Who in Science and Engineering (third edition 1997) and has received an Excellence Performance Award from NRC for four years as a subcontractor.
Some of the Chinese customs and traditions are still practiced by Jy-An and his family. One of the biggest holiday celebrations is the Chinese New Year. On Chinese New Year they traditionally have family gatherings with special meals, similar to the American Thanksgiving celebration. They pass out lucky money that is in red envelopes to the children. They also observe the full moon festival and eat moon cakes and go outside and admire the beauty, size, and brightness of the full moon.
Another Chinese belief is the balance of the elements. The Chinese believe that certain foods should not be eaten when you are weak or sick because sickness is caused by an imbalance of the elements and these foods will make you weaker and sicker. Exercise and meditation is also believed to help restore a person's inner harmony. Jy-An regularly practices Tai Chi and meditates daily. He also serves as a Tai-Chi instructor for the Tai-Chi Club of Lockheed Martin's Recreation Department.
Links to some interesting web sites about China were provided by Jy-An and are listed on the Links page.
Xun-Li Wang
One of the greatest memories from Xun-Li Wang's childhood in the People's Republic of China is the Spring Festival or Chinese New Year. Xun-Li remembers as a child being 'let loose' in his neighborhood on New Year's Eve, lighting firecrackers, comparing firecracker 'collections' with the other children, and just having a wonderfully fun time. Before bedtime, parents and grandparents would give each child money in a red envelope. The children would sleep with the envelope under their pillow on New Year's Eve night. This money was call Ya-Sui and symbolized good luck for the new year. On New Year's Day, Xun-Li would receive a set of new clothes for the New Year, which for many children, would be the only time they would receive any new clothes for that year. The clothes were worn on New Year's Day and the children and their parents would visit relatives and friends to wish them a happy new year.
Today, firecrackers are forbidden in most cities for fear of fire, so that part of the fun is long gone. For Xun-Li, life has taken him far from his birthplace of Harbin in the People's Republic of China. After receiving his B.S. degree in Physics from Beijing University in China, Xun-Li traveled to Ames, Iowa for graduate study at Iowa State University, where he received his Ph.D. in condensed matter physics.
Xun-Li's doctoral thesis was on neutron diffraction study of the magnetic properties in high-Tc superconducting materials. Because ORNL has such a strong program in both neutron scattering and in materials, when Xun-Li was presented with the opportunity to come to Oak Ridge to pursue his career, the choice was obvious to him.
Xun-Li is a member of the research staff in the Diffraction and Thermophysical Properties Group which is part of the Metals and Ceramics Division at ORNL. His research endeavors involve neutron and x-ray scattering techniques, residual stress, phase transformation, crystal structure, and magnetic properties of materials. He has received several commendations and awards for his technical work during his time at ORNL, most recently receiving the A.F. Davis Silver Medal from the American Welding Society.
Mohana Yethiraj is a research staff member in the Neutron Scattering Section of the Solid State Division (SSD). Mohana came to the United States following the receipt of a bachelor's degree from the University of Bombay to study physics at the University of Missouri-Columbia, where she received her Ph.D. in 1986. She became an ORNL postdoctoral research associate in the SSD in 1992. Mohana trained as a classical Indian dancer until the age of 17. Her mother still lives in Bombay, where Mohana grew up.
Dr. Zhaohui Yao is a visiting scholar from Tsinghau University in Beijing, China. She is currently working with the Thermal Hydraulics and Energy Storage group of the Engineering Science section in the Engineering Technology Division performing research on micro channel fluid behavior. She was born in Changsha at Huanan province of PR China. Her husband is currently a postdoc in Solid State Division and they have a daughter who is almost two years old. Her daughter has remained in China with her grandparents while Zhaohui is here completing her research. She takes comfort in talking with her parents every week and hearing her daughter call her mama in Chinese. In China, the Spring Festival and Middle Autumn Festival (Moon Festival) are very important. During the Spring Festival, Zhaohui and her family like to eat ravioli. During the Middle Autumn Festival, they like to eat moon cake. Moon cake is a kind of pastry with mostly sweet fillings made for the Moon Festival. It tastes sweet and soft. Previously it was made round like the moon; now it has many shapes. Usually two words (yue bing) are baked on it. During these Festivals, they must phone her parents and say hello to them. She has won a science and technology progress award from the national education department and science and technology progress awards from the national nuclear industrial general corporation along with her colleagues in China.
Jizhong Zhou of the Environmental Sciences Division was born in Shaoyang City, Hunan Province, PR China (Southern China, near Canton). His wife is Xiaoya Shi and they have two children, Beth Zhou who is 13 and Benjamin Zhou who is 5. Jizhong came to East Tennessee to work at ORNL and is currently a staff scientist with expertise in molecular biology, microbial genomics, microbial ecology, system ecology, molecular evolution, mathematics and bioinformatics. He currently has four projects funded by DOE. In 1996 he was an Alexander Hollaender Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow and in 1998 received the Research Accomplishment Award at ORNL. In 1999, Jizhong chaired the The 7th Conference on Small Genomes in Washington, D. C. and the DOE Natural and Accelerated Bioremediation Research Workshop (NABIR) in Application of Genomic Technology to Bioremediation in Washington, D. C.