Artificial intelligence tools secure tomorrow’s electric grid
Electric vehicles can drive longer distances if their lithium-ion batteries deliver more energy in a lighter package. A prime weight-loss candidate is the current collector, a component that often adds 10% to the weight of a battery cell without contributing energy.
Jack Orebaugh, a forensic anthropology major at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, has a big heart for families with missing loved ones. When someone disappears in an area of dense vegetation, search and recovery efforts can be difficult, especially when a missing person’s last location is unknown. Recognizing the agony of not knowing what happened to a family or friend, Orebaugh decided to use his internship at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory to find better ways to search for lost and deceased people using cameras and drones.
The 21st Symposium on Separation Science and Technology for Energy Applications, Oct. 23-26 at the Embassy Suites by Hilton West in Knoxville, attracted 109 researchers, including some from Austria and the Czech Republic. Besides attending many technical sessions, they had the opportunity to tour the Graphite Reactor, High Flux Isotope Reactor and both supercomputers at ORNL.
Drawing from his experience during the pandemic, Domenick Leto recognizes the need for the United States to have inexpensive, reliable capabilities to combat any type of disruption to national security, including nationwide medical emergencies. Leto and colleagues received a patent for a simple, inexpensive way to sterilize masks, plastic, and medical equipment from the COVID-19 virus.
For years, Duane Starr led workshops at ORNL to help others from across the U.S. government understand uranium processing technologies. After his retirement, Starr donated a 5-foot-tall working model, built in his garage, that demonstrates vibration harmonics, consistent with operation of a super critical gas centrifuge rotor, a valuable resource to ongoing ORNL-led workshops.
On Nov. 1, about 250 employees at Oak Ridge National Laboratory gathered in person and online for Quantum on the Quad, an event designed to collect input for a quantum roadmap currently in development. This document will guide the laboratory's efforts in quantum science and technology, including strategies for expanding its expertise to all facets of the field.
Nuclear engineering students from the United States Military Academy and United States Naval Academy are working with researchers at ORNL to complete design concepts for a nuclear propulsion rocket to go to space in 2027 as part of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency DRACO program.
A 19-member team of scientists from across the national laboratory complex won the Association for Computing Machinery’s 2023 Gordon Bell Special Prize for Climate Modeling for developing a model that uses the world’s first exascale supercomputer to simulate decades’ worth of cloud formations.
A team of eight scientists won the Association for Computing Machinery’s 2023 Gordon Bell Prize for their study that used the world’s first exascale supercomputer to run one of the largest simulations of an alloy ever and achieve near-quantum accuracy.
Digital twins are exactly what they sound like: virtual models of physical reality that continuously update to reflect changes in the real world.