Profiles

Travis Grove

Travis Grove, originally from Dix, Illinois, is a graduate student studying nuclear engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In addition, the summer of 2003 was his second as a student working at Technical Area 18 at Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Grove said he first found out about the programs at the Laboratory because, "My thesis advisor is a contractor here." Roy Axford, an affiliate in the Applied Physics Division (X-3), his advisor, has worked in Los Alamos each summer for many years, he said.

Grove applied for a fellowship through the South Carolina Universities Research and Education Foundation (SCUREF) and worked hard at contacting the necessary people at the Laboratory. It was difficult, he said, but in the long run, "it all worked out, so I'm happy."

His project in the summer of 2003 involved work with the Monte Carlo Neutron and Photon (MCNP) transport code, "modeling certain experiments that they were doing." He spent considerable time "comparing different cross-section libraries." His work was similar to what he had done in the summer of 2002, he said, but this year, he had a clearance, and that fact made it possible to do more.

His mentor, once again, was Peter Jaegers of the Advanced Nuclear Technology Group (NIS-6), and, Grove said, the relationship was a good one. "I see him at least once a day," he said. "He's a nice guy." Grove added that Jaegers "was one of the major reasons that I came back."

Asked whether his work at the Laboratory connects well with his university studies, he said, "In some respects," but he added, "What I'm doing (at the university) is more mathematical." He is just starting on a Ph.D. thesis that involves "applications of Lie groups (a mathematical approach) to nuclear engineering problems." He used his thesis work a little this summer, he said, in helping another student at the Laboratory.

Living in New Mexico has not been a new experience for Grove because he spent time at Philmont Boy Scout Ranch in northeastern New Mexico when he was younger. He said housing in Los Alamos has "worked out fine" for him. He got an apartment in a complex on Iris Street.

Asked how he feels about living in Los Alamos, he said there are "not too many social activities in Los Alamos itself." He spends his spare time reading, hiking, and visiting Santa Fe or Albuquerque, he said.

But when he was asked if he would recommend the Laboratory to another student, he said, "Of course." He explained that he finds his program interesting because "you get to see real work." He has watched while staff members "build things and perform experiments," and he has had an opportunity to run some machines. "It's a lot of fun," he said.

He hopes to return next summer, and he said he would consider becoming a technical staff member at the Laboratory some day. His long-term goals are a doctorate, a postdoctoral position, and a research-oriented job.