Polyphase wireless power transfer system achieves 270-kilowatt charge, s...
UT-Battelle, the managing contractor for the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has pledged $30,000 toward construction of The Change Center, a new community activity center for teenagers and young adults in Knoxville.
The Change Center will be a “safe, strategic...
The ability to realistically simulate a range of scientific phenomena, such as supernova explosions and the behavior of materials at the nanoscale, has proven a boon to researchers across the scientific spectrum.
Few jobs are more massive than that of building a nuclear power plant, a project that takes years and billions of dollars to complete. But once a new plant is finished, how do engineers know it will operate as designed?
In October 2016, the Tennessee Valley Authority began full com...
When Dustin Leverman was growing up, he likely didn’t imagine that his interest in machines would someday turn into a career at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory. But since childhood, he has been curious about how things work.
“When I was little, my dad would...
Viral Patel came to the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory with the aim of conducting research that would provide benefits to the average consumer, and his work has not disappointed. Patel jumped into three energy efficiency projects almost immediately after start...
As a child, Suzanne Parete-Koon knew she wanted to understand how things work.
That curiosity led to a career first as a computational astrophysicist and later as a user support specialist for one of the world’s most powerful supercomputers—the Cray XK7 Titan, located at the US Depa...
When an earthquake strikes, the release of energy creates seismic waves that often wreak havoc for life at the surface. Those same waves, however, present an opportunity for scientists to peer into the subsurface by measuring vibrations passing through the Earth.
Using advanced mod...
Eric Pierce’s work studying the interaction between water and rocks has taken him from coast to coast, including a stop in Washington, DC, before settling in East Tennessee—all part of what he describes as a lifetime journey of learning.
Nuclear reactors require around-the-clock attention. Before the sun has even begun to rise, nuclear reactor controller Maureen Searles is already well into her shift at Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s High Flux Isotope Reactor.
HFIR produces one of the world’s highest steady-stat...
Researchers have long sought electrically conductive materials for economical energy-storage devices. Two-dimensional (2D) ceramics called MXenes are contenders. Unlike most 2D ceramics, MXenes have inherently good conductivity because they are molecular sheets made from the carbides ...