Chair
Hannah Gardiner
Hannah Gardiner is a fifth year Ph.D. student in Nuclear Engineering at the University of Florida. She received her M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Florida in May 2016 and her B.S. in Physics from Louisiana State University in May 2014. Her current research is focused on designing an x-ray backscatter radiography system to measure in-field root system architecture in order to produce crops that increase carbon-organic matter in the soil, reduce fertilizer use, and increase water productivity. She has interned at Pacific Northwest National Lab developing algorithms for low-count radiation measurements as well as at RAND Corporation providing guidance for radiological and nuclear event preparation.
Hannah is an active member of the American Nuclear Society (ANS), serving on the National ANS Social Media Team, is a past secretary for UF chapter of the the Institute for Nuclear Material Management (INMM), and serves as the Chair of the UF College of Engineering Graduate Student Council. In her free time, Hannah enjoys cooking, travelling, and exploring the outdoors with her dog, Bear.
Co-Vice Chairs
Isaac Meyer
Isaac Meyer is currently a second-year PhD student in the Nuclear Science and Engineering Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He received a B.S. in Nuclear Engineering from UC Berkeley in 2017. Isaac’s current research is in the propagation of uncertainty in neutronics simulations. He has had internship experiences at Argonne and Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Isaac is an active member of the MIT ANS chapter and enjoys participating in outreach events to share what he has learned about a variety of nuclear topics. Outside of class, Isaac enjoys attending concerts, reading science fiction, and the occasional hike.
Jillian Newmyer
Jillian Newmyer is a second year graduate student in Radiation Health Physics at Oregon State University. Her current research focus is evaluating radionuclide uptake in frogs around Fukushima. She graduated from the University of Tennessee with a BS in Nuclear Engineering and a minor in physics. She is originally from Columbia, South Carolina, where her interest in the nuclear industry was peaked due to the closeness of the VC Summer Nuclear Power Plant. She has previously interned at Plant Hatch in Baxley, GA in the Reactor Engineering Department and at SHINE Medical Technologies as a criticality safety intern.
She enjoys spending her free time teaching nuclear science to little kids, catching up on Netflix shows, and playing one of her many board games.
Delegates
Marie Bolt
Marie Bolt is currently pursuing a B.S. in Nuclear Engineering at Texas A&M University and minoring in Russian and mathematics. Her current research interests are in the materials science aspect of nuclear engineering, particularly in advanced materials for molten salt reactors. Marie is contracted with the U.S. Navy and will serve seven years as a nuclear propulsion engineer following her graduation from Texas A&M in 2021. After leaving active duty, she plans to complete her education by earning an M.S. in Nuclear Nonproliferation and a Ph.D. in Materials Science so she may one day work in R&D for the U.S. Department of Defense.
Marie is an active member of both the American Nuclear Society (ANS), the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management (INMM), and the 2019 TNESD, which is the Texan version of NESD. In her free time, Marie likes to experiment with cookie recipes, watch Criminal Minds, and practice her Russian on her very fat cat, Ricky.
Robert Carroll
Robert Carroll is a Master in Public Policy student at the Harvard Kennedy School where he is focused on the intersection of nuclear energy technology and public policy. Before beginning his graduate studies, Robert invested in early-stage tech companies throughout the Middle East as a member of King Abdullah’s venture capital firm Oasis500. Robert’s interest in technology and international relations led him to join Google in Mountain View, California, where he helped then-Alphabet Chairman Eric Schmidt expand internet access in Cuba. Robert is currently a summer fellow at Oklo Inc in Sunnyvale, California.
Samuel D’Amico
Samuel D’Amico is a second year law student at the University of Wisconsin and is expecting to graduate in 2021. He graduated from Idaho State University in 2018 with a B.S. in Nuclear Engineering and a B.A. in Political Science. He intends to practice law in the nuclear industry, with an emphasis on policy and regulation. He has previous experience working in communications and data analysis for Idaho National Laboratory, and as a laboratory assistant at the Idaho Accelerator Center.
Samuel was born and raised in Pocatello, Idaho, and enjoys camping, hiking, fishing, skiing, and mountain biking.
Evan Gonzalez
Evan is a fourth year PhD student at University of Michigan. His research focuses on developing transient Monte Carlo methods for radiation transport. He was a Texas-NESD delegate in 2017, a NESD delegate in 2019, and a NESD co-vice chair in 2020. He has interned at Los Alamos, Argonne, and Oak Ridge National Laboratories and hopes to establish a career as a research scientist after graduation.
Alexandra Laing
Alex Laing is a student at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute planning on graduating in May 2020 with a B.S. in nuclear engineering. Alex spent last summer on campus as a student researcher in the Gaerttner Linear Accelerator working to redesign the beam monitoring system. Alex is currently an intern at Knolls Atomic Power Lab in the Non-Destructive Testing Engineering group.
Alex has been involved in Women in Nuclear and American Nuclear Society since freshman year and is currently serving as the president of the RPI WIN chapter. She is also involved on campus in greek life as a member of Alpha Phi and as a Bystander Intervention Peer Educator. Off campus she enjoys reading, cooking, and hanging out with friends.
Andrew O’Connor
Andrew O’Conor is a PhD Candidate in Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Florida (UF). His research interests bridge the nuclear, materials, and space realms; presently, his research projects include radioisotope power sources and lightweight, multifunctional neutron radiation shielding materials for space applications. Beginning fall 2019, he will be a NASA Space Technology Research Fellow. He currently serves as the Vice-Chair of the Engineering Graduate Student Council at UF. Previously, he earned a Bachelors of Science in Nuclear Engineering from Purdue University in 2017. Andrew’s hobbies include reading, exercising, and competitive trivia.
Joseph Orellana
Joseph Orellana is currently finishing up his M.S. in Mechanical Engineering at North Carolina State University and is expected to graduate at the end of 2019 with a focus on fracture mechanics, heat transfer, and fluid dynamics within nuclear reactors. He also obtained his B.S. in Nuclear Engineering from North Carolina State University in 2016. While as a student, Joseph has also worked with GE-Hitachi in Wilmington, NC across various nuclear and mechanical engineering roles and he will continue with GE- Hitachi after graduation. Some of the projects Joseph has worked on while at GE-Hitachi have related to Accident-Tolerant Fuel development, predictive analytics, fracture mechanics evaluations, and being a field engineer during a nuclear power plant outage.
Joseph is an active member with the American Nuclear Society (ANS) by serving as the 2019 Local Section Chair and Registration Chair for the Advances in Nuclear Nonproliferation Technology and Policy Conference in 2018. In addition, he has volunteered extensively for STEM outreach programs put on by both ANS and North American Young Generation of Nuclear (NAYGN). Outside of these organizations, Joseph enjoys gaming, writing automation scripts, podcasts, and biking
W. Robb Stewart
Robbie is a second year PhD candidate in Nuclear Science and Engineering (NSE) researching market requirements for nuclear, plant cost, and design optimization. Before coming to MIT, he completed his BS and MS in mechanical engineering at the University of Texas and went to work for the GE Global Research Center (GRC) for four years. At GRC, he led research projects for GE Aviation in gas turbine heat transfer, cumulative damage modeling, and reliability analysis with Bayesian networks. His spare time is split between frisbee, Big Brothers Big Sisters, and church. Within NSE, Robbie coordinates seminars with external speakers and is a communication lab fellow.
Jeevan Varghese
Jeevan Varghese is a recent graduate from Texas A&M University, receiving his B.S. in Nuclear Engineering. He has been an intern for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in the Office of Radiation and Indoor Air where he researched the future of environmental regulations in regards to the introduction of advanced reactors and has also worked as advocate for higher education initiatives for Texas A&M and The University of Texas at Austin. His research delves into the accommodation of advanced reactor technologies on United States policy.
In the spring of 2019, Jeevan participated in the Texas Nuclear Engineering Student Delegation and is very excited to be apart of a similar delegation on the federal level. Jeevan is planning on attending law school in the coming Fall 2019 term.
Mitchell Whalen
Mitchell Whalen is an undergraduate student in the Nuclear Plasma and Radiological Engineering department at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign focusing on power, safety, and the environment. He was born in Baltimore, Maryland and lived in the state during his earlier years before moving to Montpelier, Vermont. He lived in Vermont for 9 years before graduating high school and moving to Champaign-Urbana for college. During his time in Illinois, he took several elective courses focused on nuclear waste management, including a collaborative course with the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (SKB) and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology taught at the SKB research facility in Sweden.
He is spending his final summer at UIUC working as the technical editor for an Advanced Reactor Fuel Cycle research group and serving as a peer advisor for iVenture, the university’s start-up accelerator program. Mitchell spends his free time watching sports, discovering new music, and cooking new foods from around the world.
Marc Wonders
Marc Wonders is a PhD candidate in Nuclear Engineering at Penn State University, where he is finishing his fourth year. He primarily researches radiation detection and imaging for neutrons. His thesis aims to develop a high efficiency portable neutron imager and spectrometer based on silicon photomultipliers and plastic scintillators. He is an active member of the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management (INMM) and served as the president of Penn State’s student chapter of the INMM.
Marc graduated from Washington and Lee University in 2015 with a double major in Physics and Business Administration. As an undergraduate, he participated in two physics NSF-funded Research Experience for Undergraduate programs, one at Rutgers University and one at the University of South Carolina. Outside of his nuclear-related interests he enjoys reading, traveling, playing sports, and chatting with friends.
Nuclear Engineering Student Delegation 