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Media Contacts
![ORNL scientists are currently using Proto-MPEX to perform necessary research and development that is needed to build MPEX. Credit: Genevieve Martin/Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-06/2019-P15057.jpg?h=c6980913&itok=OMsMVnNV)
Temperatures hotter than the center of the sun. Magnetic fields hundreds of thousands of times stronger than the earth’s. Neutrons energetic enough to change the structure of a material entirely.
![At the U.S. Department of Energy Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL, this part for a scaled-down prototype of a reactor was produced for industry partner Kairos Power.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-05/Kairos%20PI%201_0.jpg?h=71976bb4&itok=EYVPB9H3)
Scientists at the Department of Energy Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL have their eyes on the prize: the Transformational Challenge Reactor, or TCR, a microreactor built using 3D printing and other new approaches that will be up and running by 2023.
![Coronavirus graphic](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-04/covid19_jh_0.png?h=d1cb525d&itok=PyngFUZw)
In the race to identify solutions to the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are joining the fight by applying expertise in computational science, advanced manufacturing, data science and neutron science.
![Kat Royston](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-04/Kat%20Royston%20profile_0.jpg?h=036a71b7&itok=WTyE2n4S)
As a teenager, Kat Royston had a lot of questions. Then an advanced-placement class in physics convinced her all the answers were out there.
![VERA’s tools allow a virtual “window” inside the reactor core, down to a molecular level.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-03/core.png?h=dc920c3f&itok=BggaFrQA)
A software package, 10 years in the making, that can predict the behavior of nuclear reactors’ cores with stunning accuracy has been licensed commercially for the first time.
![Postdoctoral researcher Nischal Kafle positions a component for a portable plasma imaging diagnostic device at ORNL in February. The device, a project for ARPA-E, is built of off-the-shelf parts. Credit: Carlos Jones/ORNL](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-03/2020-P00808.jpg?h=8f9cfe54&itok=TGI-lQiS)
The techniques Theodore Biewer and his colleagues are using to measure whether plasma has the right conditions to create fusion have been around awhile.
![Scientists created a novel polymer that is as effective as natural proteins in transporting protons through a membrane. Credit: ORNL/Jill Hemman](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-03/19-G01195_nature_feature_0.png?h=e4fbc3eb&itok=K8czXmTr)
Biological membranes, such as the “walls” of most types of living cells, primarily consist of a double layer of lipids, or “lipid bilayer,” that forms the structure, and a variety of embedded and attached proteins with highly specialized functions, including proteins that rapidly and selectively transport ions and molecules in and out of the cell.
![Starch granules](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2020-02/starchgranules.png?h=0c9ab501&itok=eLsE3JOx)
Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed a new method to peer deep into the nanostructure of biomaterials without damaging the sample. This novel technique can confirm structural features in starch, a carbohydrate important in biofuel production.