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Innovations in Nuclear 2021 Winner

2021 Awardees

Open Competition


Advanced Fuels
Walter Williams First Place Purdue University In Situ Neutron Diffraction Study of Crystallographic Evolution and Thermal Expansion Coefficients in U-22.5 at %Zr During Annealing	Steven Jepeal Second Place Massachusetts Institute of Technology Intermediate Energy Proton Irradiation: Rapid, High-Fidelity Materials Testing for Fusion and Fission Energy Systems


Advanced Reactor Systems
Naiki Kaffezakis First Place Georgia Institute of Technology High Temperature Ultra-Small Modular Reactor: Pre-Conceptual Design	Bodhi Biswas Second Place Massachusetts Institute of Technology Study of Terbulence-Induced Refraction of Lower Hybrid Waves using Synthetic Scrape-Off Layer Filaments


Material Protection, Control, and Accountancy
Matthew Durbin First Place Penn State University K-Nearest Neighbors Regressions for the Discrimination of Gamma Rays and Neutrons in Organic Scintillators	Jacob Blevins Second Place North Carolina State University Enabling Ga₂O₃'s Neutron Detection Capability with Boron Doping and Conversion Layer


Material Recovery and Waste Form Development
Devon Drey Frist Place University of Tennessee at Knoxville Disorder in Ho₂Ti_2-xZr_xO₇: Pyrochlore to Defect Fluorite SOlid Solution Series	Hope Lackey Second Place Washington State University Reimagining pH Measurement: Utilizing Raman Spectroscopy for Enhanced Accuracy in Phosphoric Acid Systems


Nuclear Science and Engineering
Gabriela Picayo First Place Colorado School of Mines Characterization of the ALSEP Process at Equilibrium: Speciation and Stoichiometry of the Extracted Complex	Osvaldo Ordonez Second Place University of California at Santa Barbara Synthesis and Characterization of Two Uranyl-Aryl “Ate" Complexes


Used Fuel Disposition
Logan Breton First Place University of South Carolina Facile Oxide to Chalcogenide Conversion for Actinides Using the Born-Chalcogen Mixture Method	Jordan Stanberry Second Place University of Central Florida Oxidative Dissolution of TcO₂ by Mn(III) Minerals under Anaerobic Conditions: Implications on Technetium-99 Remediation

Competition for Students Who Attend Universities with Less Than $600 Million in 2019 Science and Engineering R&D Expenditures

Edward Duchnowski
University of Tennessee at Knoxville
Reactor Performance and Safety Characteristics of
Two-Phase Composite Moderator Concepts for Modular
High Temperature Gas Cooled Reactors

Robert Kile
University of Tennessee at Knoxville
Transformational Challenge Reactor Analysis To
Inform Preconceptual Core Design Decisions:
Sensitivity study of Transient Analysis in a Hydride-
Moderated Microreactor

Ashwin Rao
Air Force Institute of Technology
Comparison of Machine Learning Techniques to Optimize
the Analysis of Plutonium Surrogate Material via a Portable
LIBS Device

James Foster
Clemson University
Functionalized Polymer Thin Films for Plutonium Capture
and Isotopic Screening from Aqueous Sources

Dimitris Killinger
Virginia Commonwealth University
Investigation of W, Ag, and Pt Quasi-Reference Electrode
Stability in Molten NaCl-CaCl₂ with Ce(0)/Ce(III) as an
Internal Reference Redox Reaction

Undergraduate Competition

Kaitlyn Barr
University of Michigan
Verification of MPACT and VERA-CS for the APR1400 Benchmark

Victoria Davis
Coastal Carolina University
Detecting Ionizing Radiation in Space with Memristor Device

Matthew Weiss
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Effect of Natural Gamma Background Radiation on
Portal Monitor Radioisotope Unmixing

Mete Bayrak
University of Texas at Austin
An Online Neutron Activation Analysis Database (NAADB)

Ashley Raster
Missouri University of Science and Technology
High Temperature Lead Cooled Fast Reactor for Advanced Drilling

NEUP