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Plutonium oxide is loaded onto a truck for shipping. Adam Parkison/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

In June, ORNL hit a milestone not seen in more than three decades: producing a production-quality amount of plutonium-238

Chathuddasie Amarasinghe explains her research poster, “Using Microfluidic Mother Machine Devices to Study the Correlated Dynamics of Ribosomes and Chromosomes in Escherichia Coli.” Credit: Carlos Jones/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

Speakers, scientific workshops, speed networking, a student poster showcase and more energized the Annual User Meeting of the Department of Energy’s Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, or CNMS, Aug. 7-10, near Market Square in downtown Knoxville, Tennessee.

Autonomous additive manufacturing, or AI- guided 3D printing, can accurately estimate the strength and quality of printed components. This system collects information about conditions during production, including temperature, that influence the properties and quality of printed objects. Credit: Genevieve Martin/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

Autonomous labs are changing the nature of scientific investigation. Instead of humans manually orchestrating every part of an experiment, programmed equipment can carry out necessary functions. This workflow accelerates the pace of discovery by reducing the number of monotonous tasks that researchers must perform.

Takaaki Koyanagi

Takaaki Koyanagi, an R&D staff member in the Materials Science and Technology Division of ORNL, has received the TMS Frontiers of Materials award.

 

Ken Engle portrait

It was reading about current nuclear discoveries in textbooks that first made Ken Engle want to work at a national lab. It was seeing the real-world impact of the isotopes produced at ORNL 

 

Eric Myers

Eric Myers of ORNL has been named a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, effective June 21.

The DuAlumin-3D research team developed a lightweight, aluminum alloy for additive manufacturing. Credit: Carlos Jones, ORNL/U.S. Dept. of Energy

Dean Pierce of ORNL and a research team led by ORNL’s Alex Plotkowski were honored by DOE’s Vehicle Technologies Office for development of novel high-performance alloys that can withstand extreme environments.

Xiao-Ying Yu portrait

Xiao-Ying Yu, a distinguished scientist at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been named a Fellow of AVS: Science and Technology of Materials, Interfaces, and Processing, formerly American Vacuum Society.

ORNL Nuclear Chemist Clarice Phelps films a general chemistry college course on a New York set in July 2023. The course, which will be available on the online education platform Outlier.org, targets marginalized students who statistically are more likely to have difficulty with first-year chemistry courses. Credit: Photo courtesy of Clarice Phelps

ORNL nuclear chemist Clarice Phelps has long worked to educate the next generation of STEM scientists. A new endeavor will let her reach students entering college who need extra help mastering the basics they need to pursue careers in science.

Shown are additively manufactured thin-walled, functionally graded builds from IN718 to C103 alloys, via a thick transition layer having high specific strength. Credit: Brian Jordan, Soumya Nag, ORNL/U.S. Dept. of Energy

Research into a new, unique technology to fabricate composite metal parts for a wide range of applications operating in extreme environments across the aviation, space and energy industries is showing promise for additive manufacturing.