As the new director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, on 1 August Jeff Wadsworth became responsible for a $1 billion annual budget and 3800 researchers. He succeeded William Madia, who is now executive vice president for laboratory operations at Battelle, which, jointly with the University of Tennessee, oversees ORNL for the US Department of Energy (DOE).
A materials scientist from the UK, Wadsworth came to the US in 1976 and has racked up experience in both research and management. He spent 12 years at Lockheed Missiles and Space Co (now Lockheed Martin Corp), until he was lured to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which, he says, was seeking people from industry to help with technology transfer of “what was behind the fences” of the weapons lab. At LLNL, Wadsworth researched metals deformation at high temperatures and low stresses and superelastic behavior of metals and ceramics. He also...
