Chuck Kessel leads the national Blanket and Fuel Cycle program, the national Fusion Energy Systems Studies program and the Virtual Laboratory of Technology and co-leads the Liquid-Metal Plasma-Facing Components program. He's devoted his career to ensuring commercial fusion power is a viable future option.
The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and three partnering institutions have received $4.2 million over three years to apply artificial intelligence to the advancement of complex systems in which human decision making could be enhanced via technology.
ORNL has added virtual tours to its campus map, each with multiple views to show floor plans, rotating dollhouse views and 360-degree navigation. As a user travels through a map, pop-out informational windows deliver facts, videos, graphics and links.
ORNL story tips: Ice breaker data, bacterial breakdown, catching heat and finding order
A radioisotope researcher in the Radioisotope Science and Technology Division at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Davern is focusing on ways to use nanoparticles — particles 100 nanometers or smaller that can have special properties — to contain those radioisotopes and deliver them directly to cancer cells, where they can decay into different isotopes that irradiate those cells.
A collaboration between the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and a Florida-based medical device manufacturer has led to the addition of 500 jobs in the Miami area to support the mass production of N95 respirator masks.
To better understand how the novel coronavirus behaves and how it can be stopped, scientists have completed a three-dimensional map that reveals the location of every atom in an enzyme molecule critical to SARS-CoV-2 reproduction. Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory used neutron scattering to identify key information to improve the effectiveness of drug inhibitors designed to block the virus’s replication mechanism.
An international multi-institution team of scientists has synthesized graphene nanoribbons – ultrathin strips of carbon atoms – on a titanium dioxide surface using an atomically precise method that removes a barrier for custom-designed carbon nanostructures required for quantum information sciences.
Researchers from the Colorado School of Mines used neutrons at Oak Ridge National Laboratory's High Flux Isotope Reactor to measure residual stress of welds used to make large steel tanks that store molten salts for industrial concentrating solar plants.
ORNL has 3D printed a channel bracket to go into reactors at Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant this spring, to demonstrate the viability of pre-qualified additively manufactured reactor components.
Momentum Technologies Inc., a Dallas, Texas-based materials science company that is focused on extracting critical metals from electronic waste, has licensed an Oak Ridge National Laboratory process for recovering cobalt and other metals from spent lithium-ion batteries.
Tony Schmitz, joint faculty researcher in machining and machine tools at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and mechanical, aerospace and biomedical engineering professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, has been elected to the College of Fellows of the American Society for Precision Engineering.
ORNL story tips: Remote population counting, slowing corrosion and turning down the heat
Led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, a study of a solar-energy material with a bright future revealed a way to slow phonons, the waves that transport heat.
Neutron scattering at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has shown that cholesterol stiffens simple lipid membranes, a finding that may help us better understand the functioning of human cells.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Department of Energy officials dedicated the launch of two clean energy research initiatives that focus on the recycling and recovery of advanced manufacturing materials and on connected and autonomous vehicle technologies.
Through a one-of-a-kind experiment at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, nuclear physicists have precisely measured the weak interaction between protons and neutrons. The result quantifies the weak force theory as predicted by the Standard Model of Particle Physics.
Researchers have recently shed light on how cell membrane proteins could be influenced by the lipids around them. By developing a novel type of membrane model, they were able to show that the shape and behavior of a protein can be altered by exposure to different lipid compositions. The research team confirmed the artificial membrane’s structure using x-ray and neutron scattering at the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Brookhaven (BNL) and Oak Ridge National Laboratories (ORNL).
Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory used new techniques to create a composite that increases the electrical current capacity of copper wires, providing a new material that can be scaled for use in ultra-efficient, power-dense electric vehicle traction motors.
Researchers thought yttrium hydride would be an ideal moderator for the new Transformational Challenge Reactor, but no one had yet figured out how to produce the large, crack-free pieces needed. An ORNL scientist developed a process and invented a machine to do that.
The current state-of-the-art process for converting biomass-derived ethanol into aviation fuels is a costly endeavor, both in terms of energy use and capital cost. Zhenglong Li, an ORNL scientist, simplified the process by developing a catalyst that can convert ethanol into mixed olefins.
Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Nebraska have developed an easier way to generate electrons for nanoscale imaging and sensing, providing a useful new tool for material science, bioimaging and fundamental quantum research.
Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory used quantum optics to advance state-of-the-art microscopy and illuminate a path to detecting material properties with greater sensitivity than is possible with traditional tools.
Researchers at ORNL are using neutron scattering at the Spallation Neutron Source to better understand how spike proteins help the COVID-19 virus infect human cells and what drugs could be effective in stopping them.
ORNL Story Tips: Cool smart walls, magnetism twist, fuel cost savings and polymers’ impact
A team of ORNL researchers working with tungsten to armor the inside of future fusion reactors had some surprising results when looking at the probability of contamination.
Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Ohio State University discovered a new microbial pathway that produces ethylene, providing a potential avenue for biomanufacturing a common component of plastics, adhesives, coolants and other everyday products.
The Transformational Challenge Reactor will use novel materials. Researchers are testing their performance in a reactor core by irradiating them in the High Flux Isotope Reactor.
A team led by the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory created a computational model of the proteins responsible for the transformation of mercury to toxic methylmercury, marking a step forward in understanding how the reaction occurs and how mercury cycles through the environment.
A team led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory developed a novel, integrated approach to track energy-transporting ions within an ultra-thin material, which could unlock its energy storage potential leading toward faster charging, longer-lasting devices.
The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have designed and additively manufactured a first-of-its-kind aluminum device that enhances the capture of carbon dioxide emitted from fossil fuel plants and other industrial processes.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have developed artificial intelligence software for powder bed 3D printers that assesses the quality of parts in real time, without the need for expensive characterization equipment.
As the Consortium for the Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors -- DOE's first Energy Innovation Hub -- ends and transitions to VERA Users Group, it has had a long-ranging impact on the nuclear industry.
Horizon31, LLC, of Knoxville, Tenn., has exclusively licensed a novel communication system that allows users to reliably operate unmanned vehicles such as drones from anywhere in the world using only an internet connection.
A fast-acting antidote to mitigate the effects of organophosphate poisoning requires a reactivator that can effectively and efficiently cross the blood-brain barrier, bind loosely to the enzyme, chemically snatch the poison and then leave quickly. Oak Ridge National Laboratory is using neutron diffraction data towards improving a novel reactivator design.
Real-time measurements captured by researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory provide missing insight into chemical separations to recover cobalt, a critical raw material used to make batteries and magnets for modern technologies.
ORNL Story Tips: Pandemic impact, root studies, neutrons confirm, lab on a crystal and modeling fusion
The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has licensed two additive manufacturing-related technologies that aim to streamline and ramp up production processes to Knoxville-based Magnum Venus Products, Inc., a global manufacturer of fluid movement and product solutions for industrial applications in composites and adhesives.
More studies at the interface of battery materials, along with increased knowledge of the processes at work, are unleashing a surge of knowledge needed to more quickly address the demand for longer-lasting portable electronics, electric vehicles and stationary energy storage for the electric grid.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have developed an intelligent power electronic inverter platform that can connect locally sited energy resources such as solar panels, energy storage and electric vehicles and smoothly interact with the utility power grid.
Mars 2020 will be the first NASA mission that uses ORNL-produced plutonium-238, the first U.S.-produced Pu-238 in three decades. ORNL's Pu-238 will help power Perseverance across the Red Planet's surface.
An ORNL team developed CrossVis, an open-source, customizable visual analytics system that analyzes numerical, categorical and image-based data while providing multiple dynamic, coordinated views of these and other data types.
A team led by Dan Jacobson of the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory used the Summit supercomputer at ORNL to analyze genes from cells in the lung fluid of nine COVID-19 patients compared with 40 control patients.
Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have demonstrated a direct relationship between climate warming and carbon loss in a peatland ecosystem.
Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory used neutron scattering and supercomputing to better understand how an organic solvent and water work together to break down plant biomass, creating a pathway to significantly improve the production of renewable biofuels and bioproducts.
ORNL Story Tips: Predicting fire risk, solid state stability check and images in a flash
A team used the Summit supercomputer to simulate transition metal systems—such as copper bound to molecules of nitrogen, dihydrogen, or water—and correctly predicted the amount of energy required to break apart dozens of molecular systems, paving the way for a greater understanding of these materials.
Researchers from West Virginia University are using neutron scattering at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to study novel materials called high entropy oxides, or HEOs. Their goal is to collect insights into how the atoms in the HEOs bind together and whether the materials can be used to develop useful applications to improve power plant operations.
Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, are advancing gas membrane materials to expand practical technology options for reducing industrial carbon emissions.
Scientists from ORNL and a dozen other international research institutions ran a series of simulations to produce the most elaborate set of projections to date that illustrates possible changes in nine monsoon regions across five continents.
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