Dawn Shaughnessy

Dawn Angela Shaughnessy is an American radiochemist and principal investigator of the heavy element group at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.[3] She was involved in the discovery of five superheavy elements with atomic numbers 114 to 118.[1]

Dawn Shaughnessy
Shaughnessy in 2013
Born
Dawn Angela Shaughnessy
EducationEl Segundo High School
Alma materUniversity of California, Berkeley (BS, PhD)
Known forThe Chemistry of Superheavy Elements[1]
AwardsAmerican Chemical Society Fellow 2018
Scientific career
FieldsIsotope chemistry
Nuclear chemistry
InstitutionsLawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
ThesisElectron-capture delayed fission properties of neutron-deficient einsteinium nuclei (2000)
Doctoral advisorDarleane C. Hoffman[2]

Early life and education

Shaughnessy wanted to be a doctor as a child but became interested in science at middle school[4] and studied at El Segundo High School.[5] She earned her bachelor's in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1993.[6] She joined Darleane C. Hoffman's group for her doctoral studies, and completed her PhD[2] at the UC Berkeley College of Chemistry in 2000.[7][8] Her thesis investigated the delayed fission of einsteinium.[2][6] She won an award recognising her strength in graduate instruction.[6]

Research

Shaughnessy joined the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in 2000, working under Heino Nitsche.[6] As part of a United States Department of Energy effort to clean up nuclear materials in the environment, Shaughnessy studied how plutonium interacts with manganese-bearing minerals.[6] She joined the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in 2002.[9]

In 2012 her group received a $5,000 grant which they donated to the Livermore High School department of chemistry.[7] She was appointed group leader of the experimental nuclear and radiochemistry group in 2013.[10] She has been involved in campaigns to celebrate Women's History Month.[11] In 2014 she was the editor of the book The Chemistry of Superheavy Elements.[1]

Whilst leading the heavy element group, Shaughnessy partnered with the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research; the team managed to identify five new superheavy elements.[12][13][14][15] The elements were confirmed by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) in January 2016.[16][17] As they were discovered at the Livermore lab, she named element 116 Livermorium.[18] Her recent work has included nuclear forensics - being able to identify the traces of fissile material, products and activation products after an explosion.[19][20] Her team are trying to automate sample preparation and detection, allowing them to speed up their isotope analysis.[20]

Awards and honors

Shaughnessy has won numerous awards and honours including:

References
  1. Schädel, Matthias; Shaughnessy, Dawn, eds. (2016). The Chemistry of Superheavy Elements (2nd ed.). Springer. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-37466-1. ISBN 9783662500170. S2CID 122675117.
  2. Shaughnessy, Dawn Angela (2000). Electron-capture delayed fission properties of neutron-deficient einsteinium nuclei. berkeley.edu (PhD thesis). University of California, Berkeley. OCLC 892827700.
  3. Dawn Shaughnessy publications indexed by the Scopus bibliographic database. (subscription required)
  4. "Dawn Shaughnessy, Most Creative People 2016 | Fast Company". Fast Company. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  5. "Hall of Fame". elsegundohigh.org. Archived from the original on 2018-07-27. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  6. "Superheavy Element Discovery and Chemistry at LLNL | Berkeley Nuclear Engineering". nuc.berkeley.edu. Archived from the original on 2018-07-27. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  7. "Meet the Woman Who Just Changed the Periodic Table As You Know It". Verily. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  8. "Dawn Shaughnessy". pls.llnl.gov. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  9. "Dawn Shaughnessy, Most Creative People 2016 | Fast Company". Fast Company. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  10. "Women @ Energy: Dawn Shaughnessy". energy.gov. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  11. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (2013-03-21), Meet Livermore Chemist Dawn Shaughnessy, retrieved 2018-07-26
  12. Bing, Jeb. "Livermore Lab team discovers six new elements". Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  13. Netburn, Deborah (2016-01-05). "It's official: Four super-heavy elements to be added to the periodic table". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  14. "Lab scientists discover five new nuclei". Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  15. "Dawn Shaughnessy, Most Creative People 2016 | Fast Company". Fast Company. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  16. Monks, Kieron. "Nuclear detective tracking the last elements". CNN. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  17. "Livermore Lab's discovery expands chemistry's periodic table". East Bay Times. 2016-01-04. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  18. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (2016-03-17), Behold Livermorium: A Quest for New Elements, retrieved 2018-07-26
  19. "Providing data for nuclear detectives". Research & Development. 2015-03-03. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  20. "Providing data for nuclear detectives". Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 2015-03-03. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  21. "DOE recognizes Lab's outstanding mentors". Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 2010-07-02. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  22. "LLNL team donates heavily to Livermore High". Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 2011-05-18. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  23. "2012 - Inductees - Women's Hall Of Fame - Alameda County". www.acgov.org. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  24. "Shaughnessy inducted to Alameda County Women's Hall Of Fame". Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 2012-03-28. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
  25. "Researcher cracks top 10 in 'most creative' list". Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 2016-05-17. Retrieved 2018-07-26.
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