Stephen Ok. Streiffer named director of Oak Ridge Nationwide Laboratory

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Stephen Streiffer, Stanford vice chairman and interim lab director for SLAC, has been appointed director of Oak Ridge Nationwide Laboratory (ORNL). Learn Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne’s letter to SLAC employees right here and the press launch from ORNL beneath.

Stephen Ok. Streiffer (Picture credit score: Courtesy Oak Ridge Nationwide Laboratory)

UT-Battelle, LLC, has appointed Stephen Ok. Streiffer to be the subsequent director of Oak Ridge Nationwide Laboratory (ORNL). He at present serves as interim director at SLAC Nationwide Accelerator Laboratory and can be part of ORNL in October.

“Stephen is a confirmed chief with numerous expertise and a dedication to mission-driven analysis and growth,” stated Lou Von Thaer, CEO of Battelle and chair of UT-Battelle, which operates ORNL for the U.S. Division of Vitality (DOE). “All through his profession, Stephen has leveraged present strengths to create new alternatives and partnerships that strengthen our nation’s potential to innovate and compete.”

Streiffer joined SLAC final 12 months as Stanford College’s vice chairman answerable for oversight of the lab. He was named interim director in February 2023. He beforehand spent 24 years in analysis and management positions at Argonne Nationwide Laboratory, concluding his tenure because the lab’s deputy director for science and know-how.

“Our nationwide laboratories present scientists with entry to a few of the strongest analysis amenities on the earth, and Stephen has been a key chief within the growth of those capabilities,” stated Asmeret Asefaw Berhe, director of DOE’s Workplace of Science. “At Oak Ridge, Stephen’s expertise will assist to make sure continued influence that advantages the nation and world.”

At Argonne, Streiffer led the Photon Sciences Directorate and served as director of the Superior Photon Supply (APS), a DOE Workplace of Science person facility that generates ultra-bright, high-energy X-ray beams for researchers from authorities, academia, and the non-public sector. APS is present process an $815 million improve.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, from March 2020 by way of Might 2022, Streiffer additionally served as co-director of DOE’s Nationwide Digital Biotechnology Laboratory (NVBL), a consortium that included ORNL and leveraged the nationwide labs to deal with challenges associated to testing, remedy, epidemiological modeling, and provide chain bottlenecks encountered in the course of the peak of the pandemic.

Previous to APS and NVBL, Streiffer helped to create and lead Argonne’s Bodily Sciences and Engineering Directorate – which incorporates its Supplies Science, Chemical Sciences and Engineering, Nanoscience and Expertise, Excessive Vitality Physics, and Physics divisions. He additionally served as deputy affiliate laboratory director for its predecessor Vitality Sciences and Engineering Directorate. From 2000-2009, he served a management function in growth of Argonne’s Middle for Nanoscale Supplies, one other Workplace of Science person facility.

“I used to be lucky to work intently with Stephen at Argonne, so I’ve seen his dedication to teamwork and his potential to construct help first-hand,” stated Mark Peters, Battelle’s govt vice chairman of laboratory administration and operations. “Considered one of ORNL’s high priorities is to retain, recruit, and develop employees members throughout its broad portfolio of analysis and operational areas, and that’s been an necessary space of focus in Stephen’s profession. We’re thrilled he’s coming to ORNL.”

Streiffer earned his PhD in supplies science and engineering from Stanford College and a bachelor’s in supplies science from Rice College. He’s a fellow of the American Bodily Society and a member of the Supplies Analysis Society and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

“I look ahead to attending to work at Oak Ridge,” Streiffer stated. “By my roles with Workplace of Science applications and person amenities, I’ve collaborated with ORNL and its extraordinarily proficient employees for a few years. It’s an important honor to be chosen as lab director and to affix the group, and I’m dedicated to persevering with the transformative function Oak Ridge has performed in our nation’s scientific enterprise for nearly 80 years.”

Randy Boyd, president of the College of Tennessee System and vice chair of the UT-Battelle Board of Governors, praised Streiffer’s appointment: “UT is proud to companion with Battelle to handle what we imagine is the very best science laboratory within the nation, if not the world. Considered one of our most necessary obligations is to pick out and rent the very best management doable to steer the 1000’s of good those who make the lab so profitable. We imagine we’ve got achieved that in hiring Stephen Streiffer. He has the expertise, the vitality, and the imaginative and prescient to steer the lab to even better heights.”

UT-Battelle, a partnership of the College of Tennessee and Battelle Memorial Institute, operates ORNL for DOE’s Workplace of Science.