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NCCS Director Arjun Shankar gives an update on the facility’s next high-performance computing system during the OLCF User Meeting on Sept. 10, 2024.   Credit: Kurt Weiss/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

The Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility welcomed users to an interactive meeting at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory from Sept. 10–11 for an opportunity to share achievements from the OLCF’s user programs and highlight requirements for the future.

The Frontier supercomputer simulated magnetic responses inside calcium-48, depicted by red and blue spheres. Insights into the nucleus’s fundamental forces could shed light on supernova dynamics.

Nuclear physicists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory recently used Frontier, the world’s most powerful supercomputer, to calculate the magnetic properties of calcium-48’s atomic nucleus. 

Joshua New

ORNL’s Joshua New was named the 2024 Researcher of the Year by R&D World magazine as part of its R&D 100 Professional Award winners. 

Beach to show impact of a hurricane

A study found that beaches with manmade fortifications recover more slowly from hurricanes than natural beaches, losing more sand and vegetation. The researchers used satellite images and light detection and ranging data, or LIDAR, to measure elevation changes and vegetation coverage. Changes in elevation showed how much sand was depleted during the storm and how much sand returned throughout the following year. 

Weyl semimetal

At ORNL, a group of scientists used neutron scattering techniques to investigate a relatively new functional material called a Weyl semimetal. These Weyl fermions move very quickly in a material and can carry electrical charge at room temperature. Scientists think that Weyl semimetals, if used in future electronics, could allow electricity to flow more efficiently and enable more energy-efficient computers and other electronic devices.

Image with a grey and black backdrop - in front is a diamond with two circles coming out from it, showing the insides.

The world’s fastest supercomputer helped researchers simulate synthesizing a material harder and tougher than a diamond — or any other substance on Earth. The study used Frontier to predict the likeliest strategy to synthesize such a material, thought to exist so far only within the interiors of giant exoplanets, or planets beyond our solar system.

This photo is of three men sitting around a laptop computer that happens to be working on cybersecurity testing equipment.

A newly established internship between ORNL and Maryville College is bringing cybersecurity careers to a local liberal arts college. The internship was established by a Maryville College alumni who recently joined ORNL. 

Arial view of the Atchafalaya Basin

In the wet, muddy places where America’s rivers and lands meet the sea, scientists from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are unearthing clues to better understand how these vital landscapes are evolving under climate change.

Honors & Awards in white with a green background with an oak leaf underneath

ORNL's Guang Yang and Andrew Westover have been selected to join the first cohort of DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy Inspiring Generations of New Innovators to Impact Technologies in Energy 2024 program. The program supports early career scientists and engineers in their work to convert disruptive ideas into impactful energy technologies. 

Three team members looking at plants stand in front of a mountain scene, two are in orange safety vests.

When Oak Ridge National Laboratory's science mission takes staff off-campus, the lab’s safety principles follow. That’s true even in the high mountain passes of Washington and Oregon, where ORNL scientists are tracking a tree species — and where wildfires have become more frequent and widespread.