As the manager of the Basic Energy Sciences Programs and associate division director for the Metals and Ceramics Division, she is responsible for management of research including theoretical studies, materials characterization, radiation effects, intermetallics, ceramic composites, and welding science and numerous division-wide initiatives.
Dr. Horton joined ORNL as a research staff member in 1981. She has served as technical assistant to the laboratory's associate director for physical sciences, as technical assistant to the laboratory director, as group leader of the microscopy and microanalytical sciences group in the Metals and Ceramics Division, and as group leader in the division's surfaces and interfaces group.
She received a bachelor's degree in mathematics and physics from Grove City College in Pennsylvania and was awarded master's and doctorate degrees in materials science from the University of Virginia.
In 1993 Dr. Horton was elected to a three-year term on the board of trustees of ASM International, an organization of researchers in the field of metallurgy. She became the first woman to serve in this capacity.
She is the division's coordinator of pre-college education activities. She has also served as a member of the ASM Advisory Technical Awareness Council, Nominating Committee, Editorial Committee for Advanced Materials and Processes and ASM 2000 Committee.
She lives in Oak Ridge with her husband, Joseph. The couple have three children.
The Oak Ridge National Laboratory, one of the Department of Energy's multiprogram national research and development facilities, is managed by Martin Marietta Energy Systems, which also manages the Oak Ridge K-25 Site, and the Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant.