Nine Graduate Students Tour Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Nine Graduate Students Tour Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Despite the chilly weather over the fall break, physics graduate students maintained their excellent tradition of national lab expedition this year. On October 14, nine physics graduate students visited Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to experience the world-leading academic and research environment. ORNL, managed by the U.S. Department of Energy, is the largest multidisciplinary science and technology laboratory from fundamental physics such as nuclear physics and neutron physics, to biomedical science and engineering, super-computing and clear energy.

Overall, students were introduced to the current research topics and job opportunities at ORNL, and toured the fascinating facilities at various labs. In the morning, students received a warm welcome from Dr. Ian S. Anderson, the Director of Graduate Education and University Partnerships, and had wonderful presentations on research and opportunities by multiple ORNL researchers. Prof. Georgia Tourassi, who is an alumna of Duke, now Director of Biomedical Science and Engineering Center (BSEC), also gave the students an overview of BSEC. Later, students visited the historic Graphite Nuclear Reactor, which was built for the Manhattan Project during World War II. At noon, students had an informal lunch meeting with current ORNL professors, post-docs and graduate students. Many topics were discussed such as academic career developments, working at the national laboratory, carrying out interdisciplinary research and how to transfer knowledge from research to industry. Mary Jane Simpson, a recent graduate student from Prof. Warren Warren's lab in Duke Chemistry, also attended this meeting and talked with our students about her experiences at ONRL. The lectures and talks are beneficial, as physics graduate student Sourav Sen (entered '13) says: “It was very enriching to interact with the professionals and research scientists about their own research in frontier fields along with facilitating research in both academia and industry by their state-of-the-art facilities and expertise. I also learned more about the organizational structure of the National Labs.”

In the afternoon, staff members led students to many scientific facilities, such as the state-of-the-art computing machine the Titan, High Temperature Material Laboratory, Spallation Neutron Sources and Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences. Besides being fascinated by the laboratory facilities such as various high resolution electron microscopes, advanced accelerator and neutron sources, innovative knowledge transformation from science to technology and many existing resources such as user facilities, fellowships and internships at ORNL also broaden our students' horizon. Physics graduate student Andrew Seredinski (entered '14) says that he was very impressed by the way the national lab emphasizes making extensive applications for industries and developing various technologies to solve problems, such as cleanrooms for advanced functional material research. Andrew also says it is very helpful to know that many advanced user facilities in the national lab are free and open to public.

Another physics graduate student Weiyao Ke (entered '14) summarizes his experiences: “Maybe the most valuable gain from this trip is the realization that there are many opportunities at the national lab. Postdoc and fellows here enjoy a great degree of independence in research... It seems you are always faced with problem have not seen before by anyone.”

Special thanks to physics graduate student Forrest Friesen (entered '11) who volunteered for driving. Thank you to Justin Raybern (entered '14) for the photographs. See all pictures on Flickr here.

Yuchen Zhao, author of this article, is a first-year graduate student in the Duke Physics Department.