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Media Contacts
![Mickey Wade](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2023-03/2022-P03120.jpg?h=8f9cfe54&itok=w-IR0uZ1)
Mickey Wade has been named associate laboratory director for the Fusion and Fission Energy and Science Directorate at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, effective April 1.
![UKAEA will provide novel fusion materials to be irradiated in ORNL’s HFIR facility over the next four years. From left, Kathy McCarthy, Jeremy Busby, Mickey Wade, Prof Sir Ian Chapman (UKAEA CEO), Cynthia Jenks and Yutai Kato will represent this new partnership. Not pictured: Dr. Amanda Quadling, UKAEA’s Director of Materials Research Facility. Credit: Genevieve Martin/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2023-03/ukaea_0.png?h=781886b5&itok=8TMsXYxx)
ORNL has entered a strategic research partnership with the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, or UKAEA, to investigate how different types of materials behave under the influence of high-energy neutron sources. The $4 million project is part of UKAEA's roadmap program, which aims to produce electricity from fusion.
![From left are UWindsor students Isabelle Dib, Dominik Dziura, Stuart Castillo and Maksymilian Dziura at ORNL’s Neutron Spin Echo spectrometer. Their work advances studies on a natural cancer treatment. Credit: Genevieve Martin/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2023-03/2022-P14758_0.jpg?h=c6980913&itok=YJLFDsPp)
A scientific instrument at ORNL could help create a noninvasive cancer treatment derived from a common tropical plant.
![Heat is typically carried through a material by vibrations known as phonons. In some crystals, however, different atomic motions — known as phasons — carry heat three times faster and farther. This illustration shows phasons made by rearranging atoms, shown by arrows. Credit: Jill Hemman/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2023-02/23-G01840_Phason_Manly_proof3_0.png?h=10d202d3&itok=3NpjriWi)
Warming a crystal of the mineral fresnoite, ORNL scientists discovered that excitations called phasons carried heat three times farther and faster than phonons, the excitations that usually carry heat through a material.
![Paul Langan will oversee ORNL's research directorate focused on biological and environmental systems science. Credit: ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-12/2019-P15617_0.jpg?h=bf9cb32e&itok=4n50VPVf)
Paul Langan will join ORNL in the spring as associate laboratory director for the Biological and Environmental Systems Science Directorate.
![Ilias Belharouak, Grace Burke and Phil Snyder represent ORNL’s strengths in battery technology, materials science and fusion energy research.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-12/22-G04341_Corporate-Fellows-photos.jpg?h=e91a75a9&itok=skT1h7xu)
Three researchers at ORNL have been named ORNL Corporate Fellows in recognition of significant career accomplishments and continued leadership in their scientific fields.
![New manufacturing process produces better, cheaper cathodes for lithium-ion batteries. Credit: Andy Sproles/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-12/battery.cathode.illust_1.jpg?h=7b747668&itok=LCfeMjz9)
Researchers at ORNL have developed a new method for producing a key component of lithium-ion batteries. The result is a more affordable battery from a faster, less wasteful process that uses less toxic material.
![This diagram demonstrates how a concentrating solar thermal plant could use molten salts to store solar energy that could later be used to generate electricity. Credit: Jaimee Janiga/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-09/2022-G02085_Mcfarlane_ReducingSaltsCorrosiveEffect_STFIG_7nj_ForReview_Equipment%20v2_txt_0.jpg?h=995a696e&itok=bT3iWSgL)
Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists recently demonstrated a low-temperature, safe route to purifying molten chloride salts that minimizes their ability to corrode metals. This method could make the salts useful for storing energy generated from the sun’s heat.
![ORNL postdoctoral researcher Runming Tao, pictured with a coin cell battery, led an effort to discover new anode materials for fast-charging lithium-ion batteries. Credit: ORNL/Genevieve Martin, U.S. Dept. of Energy](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-09/2022-P09174.jpg?h=c6980913&itok=C8xoI7J4)
Researchers at ORNL and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, discovered a key material needed for fast-charging lithium-ion batteries. The commercially relevant approach opens a potential pathway to improve charging speeds for electric vehicles.
![ORNL fusion technology scientist Tim Bigelow, right, stands near the control console in ORNL’s fusion control room with Matt Houde of Quaise Energy. Their partnership aims to tackle technical challenges with the Millimeter Wave Drilling System that Quaise has developed. Credit: Carlos Jones/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy.](/sites/default/files/styles/list_page_thumbnail/public/2022-09/fusion-thumb.jpg?h=06ac0d8c&itok=QDFJEG_G)
Researchers in the geothermal energy industry are joining forces with fusion experts at ORNL to repurpose gyrotron technology, a tool used in fusion. Gyrotrons produce high-powered microwaves to heat up fusion plasmas.