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The world is full of “huge, gnarly problems,” as ORNL research scientist and musician Melissa Allen-Dumas puts it — no matter what line of work you’re in. That was certainly the case when she would wrestle with a tough piece of music.

Carrie Eckert applies her skills as a synthetic biologist at ORNL to turn microorganisms into tiny factories that produce a variety of valuable fuels, chemicals and materials for the growing bioeconomy.

An international problem like climate change needs solutions that cross boundaries, both on maps and among disciplines. Oak Ridge National Laboratory computational scientist Deeksha Rastogi embodies that approach.

Belinda Akpa is a chemical engineer with a talent for tackling big challenges and fostering inclusivity and diversity in the next generation of scientists.

From Denmark to Japan, the UK, France, and Sweden, physicist Ken Andersen has worked at neutron sources around the world. With significant contributions to neutron scattering and the scientific community, he’s now serving in his most important role yet.

Nuclear physicist Caroline Nesaraja of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory evaluates nuclear data vital to applied and basic sciences. 

For a researcher who started out in mechanical engineering with a focus on engine combustion, Martin Wissink has learned a lot about neutrons on the job

Marcel Demarteau is director of the Physics Division at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. For topics from nuclear structure to astrophysics, he shapes ORNL’s physics research agenda.

For over half a century, Robert Compton has been a celebrated experimentalist and inspirational leader and teacher in the fields of physics and chemistry. Compton came to work at ORNL's Health Sciences Research Division in 1965 after receiving his doctorate in physics from the University of Tennessee.

Rufus Ritchie came from Kentucky coal country, a region not known for producing physicists.