On Dec. 1, Fermilab senior scientist Anna Grassellino started her new role as the laboratory’s deputy chief technology officer. She succeeds Fermilab senior principal engineer Rich Stanek, who served as deputy CTO for five years.
In the new position, Grassellino will help lead the lab’s exciting portfolio for advancing the key technologies in high-energy physics and help oversee the realization of important accelerator projects supported by the Department of Energy Office of High Energy Physics and Office of Basic Energy Sciences.
“I’m excited to be stepping up in this role of deputy CTO,” Grassellino said. “Fermilab’s high-energy physics technologies are unique and impactful, and the research and development in accelerator and detector technologies is vital to the future of our field.”
Grassellino was appointed as the deputy head of Fermilab’s Applied Physics and Superconducting Technology Division, known as APS-TD, in 2017 and will continue to serve in that position. The division is the largest organization in the Office of the Chief Technology Officer, headed by CTO Sergey Belomestnykh.
The division’s capabilities encompass the technologies at the core of particle accelerators: superconducting radio-frequency cavities, superconducting magnets, and cryogenics. APS-TD also recently added to its portfolio superconducting quantum systems for quantum computing and quantum sensing. In addition to the R&D to advance these technologies, the division is responsible for building the key accelerator and detector components for the lab’s PIP-II accelerator and the Mu2e experiment, and for the lab’s accelerator complex. APS-TD is also responsible for the execution of important projects such as the High-Luminosity LHC Accelerator Upgrade Project and Fermilab’s contributions to SLAC’s Linac Coherent Light Source II, as well as the the planned energy upgrade LCLS-II HE. Grassellino assumed recently the role of LCLS-II HE senior team leader.
“The field of particle physics has pushed these technologies already to an incredible level of complexity, and the challenges to enable the next leaps in energy, intensity and quantum frontiers are tremendous, requiring capabilities, facilities and knowledge spanning a very broad range: from superconductivity to materials’ properties at the nanoscale, from cryogenics to fabrication of mechanical structures that have to sustain tremendous forces, from exascale computing to single-photon and single-electron handling,” Grassellino said.
Grassellino is also the co-director of the Center for Applied Physics and Superconducting Technologies, known as CAPST, a joint collaboration in the Office of the CTO between Fermilab and Northwestern University that focuses on advancing superconducting materials and devices for multiple research areas.
“I am delighted that Anna will step into the position of deputy CTO at Fermilab,” said Northwestern University Professor James Sauls, CAPST co-director. “She is an outstanding scientist and person to take on challenges and opportunities that range from superconducting technology for particle accelerators to quantum technologies for quantum sensing and quantum computing. We look forward to further strengthening the collaboration with Northwestern University in these exciting technology areas.”
At Fermilab, one of the important tasks currently assigned to the CTO by Director Nigel Lockyer is to produce a strategy document for all of the lab’s technologies. This Technology Strategy will provide a path forward for investing in technologies that the lab collectively wants to advance.
“With Sergey and my Fermilab colleagues and fellow subject matter experts, I’ll help outline a strategy that will enable us to fulfill our vision for the next 10 years. I’m looking forward to developing a technology strategy focused on the high-energy physics mission and aligned with the goals laid out in the P5 report, but also keeping in mind the important synergies outside the Office of Science’s Office of High Energy Physics, for example with the exciting world-class science facilities funded by its Office of Basic Energy Sciences,” Grassellino said.
“I am happy that Anna is accepting this new role,” said Fermilab CTO Sergey Belomestnykh. “In APS-TD, Anna was able to expand her experience and vision from superconducting technology to other areas in a very short time. I expect that she will do the same in the Office of the CTO. As deputy CTO, she will undoubtedly step up and provide her vision for the development of technology areas important for Fermilab.”
Fermilab is a DOE national laboratory supported by the Office of Science.