UT Materials Science and Engineering seniors, Reece Emery, Ian Greeley, and Joshua McCoy, presented their work to over two dozen scientists and technicians in Oak Ridge National Lab’s Neutron Scattering Division (NSD) in a one-hour virtual meeting on Thursday, May 14th. Their research titled, Materials Selection for High Temperature Neutron Scattering Sample Containers, was part of a senior design group project that also included undergraduates Ahmad Alghadeer and Shiyi Chen.

Ahmad Alghadeer, Shiyi Chen, Reece Emery, Ian Greeley, and Joshua McCoy at  Spallation Neutron Source at Oak Ridge National Lab, 2019

They presented their work characterizing and identifying key failure mechanisms of furnace experiment sample cannisters, and detailed several possible solutions to prevent the failure modes during future experiments. NSD scientists and technicians have already tested or plan to test/implement several of their solutions.

The team was advised by Dr. Claudia Rawn and Dr. Katharine Page in the spring semester course MSE 489, led by Dr. Kurt Sickafus. Michelle Everette (former UT MSE PhD student and current Scientific Associate in NSD) and Rebecca Mills (High Temperature Sample Environment team leader in NSD) were their mentors at ORNL.