Neutron Sciences Staff Awards

Casagrande Receives Cryogenic Society Honors

	On the right, Fabio Casagrande, Researh Accelerator Division.

Fabio Casagrande, Cryogenic Systems Group leader, Research Accelerator Division, is this year’s winner of the Excellence in Cryogenic Operation and Support award from the Cryogenic Society of America.

To receive the award one must show excellence in establishing, improving, and simplifying processes in cryogenic operations from small-scale to large-sale facilities.

Fabio was nominated for his leadership toward improving the availability of SNS, completing the complex design modifications for operating SNS, and effectively supervising engineers and technicians.

Burnette elected to the "Distinguished Alumnus Academy" (3/2009)

	Steve Burnette (left) receives congratulations from Mike Farrar, Research Reactors Division Operations and Analysis.

The Research Reactors Division's Steve Burnette has been honored by his alma mater, Tennessee Technological University, where he earned a BS in industrial engineering. Steve is leader of the Nuclear Materials and Experiment Analysis Group. The university's College of Engineering elected Steve to the "Distinguished Alumnus Academy" of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering. The competitive award is limited to living alumni with at least 15 years of professional experience as practicing industrial engineers. The induction ceremony will be held at the university campus in early May.

In 1985, Steve joined the ORNL Operations Division, which two years later became the Research Reactors Division. Before coming to ORNL, he worked at the K-25 Gaseous Diffusion Plant, in private industry, and for the US Army Material and Readiness Command in Texas. One of his main interests outside of work is cattle farming.

Huq Recognized by the Leadership Alliance (11/2008)

The Neutron Scattering Science Division's Ashfia Huq was recently named a Leadership Alliance Doctoral Scholar by the Leadership Alliance.  The alliance was established as a national consortium of leading research institutions and minority-serving institutions dedicated to boosting the enrollment of underrepresented minority students in graduate programs. Ashfia also received the Mary Lyon Award in January 2008.

Andrey Zheludev and Pengcheng Dai Honored by the American Physical Society

Pengcheng Dai	Andrey Zheludev

Andrey Zheludev was nominated for his elegant neutron scattering investigations of quantum magnetism and quantum critical phenomena, especially in spin-chain compounds.

Pengcheng Dai holds a joint appointment with the University of Tennessee and in the NScD. Dai was recognized for his contributions to understanding fundamental properties of magnetic excitations in high-transition temperature superconductors, f-electron heavy Fermions, and colossal magneto-resistance manganites.

Xun-Li Wang Appointed UT Adjunct Professor

The Neuron Scattering Science Division's Xun-Li Wang has been appointed as adjunct professor with the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. His appointment is in the College of Engineering, Department of Materials Science and Engineering. Xun-Li serves as the group leader for the Powder Diffraction Group and is the lead instrument scientist for the Engineering Materials Diffractometer, which is under construction at SNS.

Xun-Li received his B.S from Beijing University and a Ph.D. in Physics from Iowa State University. He came to ORNL in 1992 and joined SNS in 1999. His scientific interests include mechanical properties, phase transformation, and magnetism in advanced materials.

Herb Mook receives American Physical Society Jesse W. Beams Research Award (11/2008)

This award was presented at the 75th Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Section of the American Physical Society. The meeting was held October 29 - November 1, 2008, at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, North Carolina.  Each year, the society awards three prizes for contributions to the field.

Shown in the photo are (left to right) Mike Fowler, University of Virginia (Pegram Award for Physics Teaching), Mook, and Laurence Cain, Davidson College (Francis Slack Award for Service to Physics).

Mentor Awards - Outstanding mentors and teachers honored at ORNL (2/2008)

ORNL, DOE, and Oak Ridge Associated Universities recently recognized outstanding ORNL staff for mentoring students and teachers in laboratory education programs and throughout the community. The awards were presented recently at ORNL in a joint ceremony by ORNL's Minority Educational Institution Program and ORAU. See the full News Release...

Six NScD staff received awards for their efforts as outstanding mentors in 2007:

NSSD: Al Ekkebus	NSSD: Jamie Fernandez-Baca	NSSD: Chrissi Schnell
NSSD: Lakeisha Walker	NSSD: Bob Martin, Mason, John Haines, Jaime Fernandez-Baca, Al Ekkebus, Greg Smith, Chrissi Schnell, and Lakeisha Walker	RAD: Jeff Holmes
NOT PICTURED RAD: Willem Blokland

Danilov Receives EPS Accelerator Group Prize (2/2008)

Slava Danilov

Research Accelerator Division physicist Slava Danilov recently received a European Physical Society Accelerator Group 2008 Achievement Prize. Slava was recognized "for numerous contributions to accelerator physics, in particular for the proposal, calculation, design, construction, and demonstration of efficient laser H- stripping." As Slava puts it: "Laser stripping is conversion of H- atoms to protons using lasers during injection into SNS ring. The present conversion scheme uses carbon foils, which produces the highest radiation at SNS. The carbon foils will start to break down at SNS megawatt intensities–one of the most severe problems for SNS power upgrade projects. The new technology with lasers (if developed) will eliminate old technology drawbacks."

One of three prizes awarded biennally by the society, this award is for an individual in the early part of his or her career, having made a recent, significant, original contribution to the accelerator field. The award will be presented at the 2008 European Particle Accelerator Conference in Genoa, Italy.

Slava received his PhD in Physics from the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics, Novosibirsk, Russa, in 1995. He joined the SNS Project in 1998 and is part of the Accelerator Physics Group. His research interests include self-consistent distributions of intense beam, collective effects, nonlinear dynamics and integrable systems, and quantum physics of beams.

Huq cited by Mount Holyoke College (1/2008)

The Neutron Scattering Science Division's Ashfia Huq was recently awarded the Mary Lyon Award by the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College. The award, named after the college's 1837 founder, Mary Lyon, is presented to an outstanding young alumna who has been out of college 15 years or less.

Ashfia is an instrument scientist with POWGEN3, a third-generation powder diffractometer at the Spallation Neutron Source. Her area of expertise is high-resolution neutron and X-ray powder diffraction of condensed matter systems. Her scientific interests include hydrogen storage materials, catalysis, magnetic and structural properties of strongly correlated electron systems and ab initio structure solutions from powder data.

Chakoumakos elected MSA Fellow (12/2007)

Neutron scientist Bryan Chakoumakos was recently elected a fellow of the Mineralogical Society of America. A member of the Neutron Scattering Science Division, Bryan leads the Single-Crystal Diffraction Group. The group has five neutron scattering instruments in various stages of design and construction, located at HFIR and SNS.

The MSA was founded in 1919 and, among other goals, encourages fundamental research on natural materials and supports education through its publications, educational grants, and courses.