Emily Bobrow of The Wall Street Journal profiles the life of Dr. Thomas Zacharia, the leader of Oak Ridge National Lab.
- After working for and leading Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) for 35 and 5 years, respectively, Dr. Thomas Zacharia is set to retire.
- Dr. Zacharia immigrated to the United States from India with “a degree in mechanical engineering and $8 in his pocket.”
- During his time at ORNL, Zacharia helped to advance the lab’s supercomputing capabilities and innovative thinking.
- Dr. Zacharia’s leadership and dedication has played in pivotal role the United States’ global leadership in energy innovation.
“‘I wanted to capture that sense of mission for a new era,’ he explains. ‘For this generation, it’s climate change and the energy transition.’ As director, he has led advances in everything from decarbonization to supercomputing, while creating one of the most diverse leadership teams among the 17 national labs run by the Energy Department. ‘Diversity of ideas and diversity of experience are very important for labs that tackle really big, challenging problems,’ he explains.”
Read the full article here.
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