physics

Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Oak Ridge National Laboratory is a physics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Oak Ridge National Laboratory rather than just read about it. In short: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is a federally funded research and development center in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1943, the laboratory is sponsored by the United States Department of Energy and administered by UT–Battelle, LLC.

Key takeaways

Oak Ridge National Laboratory belongs to physics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Oak Ridge National Laboratory to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Oak Ridge National Laboratory from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) is a federally funded research and development center in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, United States. Founded in 1943, the laboratory is sponsored by the United States Department of Energy and administered by UT–Battelle, LLC. Established in 1943, ORNL is the largest science and energy national laboratory in the Department of Energy system by size and third largest by annual budget. It is located in the Roane County section of Oak Ridge. Its scientific programs focus on materials, nuclear science, neutron science, energy, high-performance computing, environmental science, systems biology and national security, sometimes in partnership with the state of Tennessee, universities and other industries. ORNL has several of the world's top supercomputers, including Frontier, ranked by the TOP500 as the world's third most powerful. The lab is a neutron and nuclear power research facility that includes the Spallation Neutron Source, the High Flux Isotope Reactor, and the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences.

Overview Oak Ridge National Laboratory is managed by UT–Battelle, a limited liability partnership between the University of Tennessee and the Battelle Memorial Institute, formed in 2000 for that purpose. The annual budget is US$2.4 billion. As of 2021 there is a staff of 5,700 working at ORNL, around 2,000 of whom are scientists and engineers, and an additional 3,200 guest researchers annually. There are five campuses on the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge reservation: the National Laboratory, the Y-12 National Security Complex, the East Tennessee Technology Park (formerly the Oak Ridge Gaseous Diffusion Plant), the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education, and the developing Oak Ridge Science and Technology Park, although the four other facilities are unrelated to the National Laboratory. The total area of the reservation is 150 square kilometres (58 sq mi) of which the lab takes up 18 square kilometres (7 sq mi).

History

In 1934 the Freel Farm Mound Site, an archaeological site and burial mound of the Late Woodland period was excavated. The site is currently inundated by Melton Hill Lake. The city of Oak Ridge was established by the Army Corps of Engineers as part of the Clinton Engineer Works in 1942 on isolated farm land as part of the Manhattan Project. During World War II, advanced research for the government was managed at the site by the University of Chicago's Metallurgical Laboratory. In 1943, construction of the Clinton Laboratories, what would later be known as the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, was completed. The site was chosen for the X-10 Graphite Reactor, used to produce plutonium from natural uranium. Enrico Fermi and his colleagues developed the world's second self-sustaining nuclear reactor after Fermi's previous experiment, the Chicago Pile-1. The X-10 was the first reactor designed for continuous operation. After the end of World War II, management of the lab was contracted by the US government to Monsanto; however, they withdrew in 1947. The University of Chicago temporarily re-assumed responsibility, with the site receiving the prestigious "National" laboratory designation, until in December 1947, when Union Carbide and Carbon Co., which already operated two other facilities at Oak Ridge, took control of the laboratory and renamed the site Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). Post-war, the demand for military science had fallen dramatically, and the future of the lab was uncertain. The X-10 reactor and the laboratory's 1,000 employees were no longer involved in nuclear weapons. Instead, it was used for scientific research. In 1946 the first medical isotopes were produced in the X-10 reactor, and by 1950 almost 20,000 samples had been shipped to various hospitals. The quantity and variety of radionuclides produced by X-10 for medicine grew steadily in the 1950s. ORNL was the only Western source of californium-252. ORNL scientists also performed the world's first successful bone marrow transplant in mice by suppressing their immune systems.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Oak Ridge National Laboratory claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In physics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Oak Ridge National Laboratory before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Oak Ridge National Laboratory ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Oak Ridge National Laboratory

In research: Oak Ridge National Laboratory appears in physics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Oak Ridge National Laboratory in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Oak Ridge National Laboratory is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1942 establishments in Tennessee, Battelle Memorial Institute, Buildings and structures in Roane County, Tennessee, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Oak Ridge National Laboratory outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Oak Ridge National Laboratory in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Oak Ridge National Laboratory means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Oak Ridge National Laboratory out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Oak Ridge National Laboratory in simple terms?

Why does Oak Ridge National Laboratory matter?

Because it connects several physics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Oak Ridge National Laboratory?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Oak Ridge National Laboratory.