ORISE Featurecast

National Science Bowl® is a fast-paced academic competition that offers teams of high school and middle school students from across the country a chance to match their wits in math and science in a series of head-to-head competitions. Regional competitions are held across the country, and 115 teams will advance from regionals to the National Science Bowl® in Washington, D.C., this April, all expenses paid! ORISE and Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellows have played a role in providing logistical support for years. In this episode of the ORISE Featurecast, hosts Michael Holtz and Natasja Brown discuss Science Bowl with educator Mary Lou O’Donnell and Sirius Drahos, who was one of Brown’s students when she coached her school’s Science Bowl team.

Imagine using a protein from bacteria as a cleaning solution to reduce or eliminate food borne illnesses. That's the research Sheetal Jha conducted as an ORISE research program participant at the United States Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service. Jha is pursuing her doctoral degree at Louisiana State University and her ORISE appointment ended in October 2025. Her presentation on bacteriocins and safer foods was named Fan Favorite at the 2025 ORISE Ignite Off! competition. Jah completed her undergraduate and graduate studies in India with a focus on pharmaceuticals, but her interest in public health, safety and food science served as a bridge to her current research focus.

Annakate Schatz is an ORISE Research Program Participant at the USDA National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility. She is studying foot and mouth disease among hooved animals – pigs, sheep, goats, cattle and water buffalo – in Vietnam. Foot and mouth disease is not present in United States, but it is endemic around the world. The disease has some significant economic consequences for farm productivity and potential trade restrictions. As a result, the USDA wants to make sure that we have a good understanding of how the disease functions and how it might spread. By building resilience to that disease in other countries, we can prepare for how the US might respond, should there be an outbreak. In her off hours, Schatz enjoys roller derby, a conversation about which could have been an episode all by itself.

Nearly every conversation we have on the ORISE Featurecast about the Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship discusses the challenge of the application process. In this episode, Michael Holtz and guest co-host Natasja Brown take a deep dive into the application and the process through which AEF Fellows are selected. They are joined by Stacie Marvin, an AEF alumnus who was a fellow on Capitol Hill in 2023, and Lora Taylor, a current Fellow at Library of Congress.

Sk Nafiz Rahaman is an ORISE participant in the Graduate Research Program at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. As part of his internship, he is developing an interactive tool to visualize electric grid risks and analyzing the impact of data center growth on energy affordability. In this episode of the ORISE Featurecast, Rahaman talks about the part of his research that focuses on the encroachment of kudzu and other high-growth plants on power lines and the potential to cause outages. His poster “A National-Scale Spatiotemporal Framework for Power Outage Trend Detection Using EAGLE-I Data” was awarded first place at the 2025 ORISE Symposium. Rahaman grew up in Bangladesh and is a doctoral student at Mississippi State University. In this conversation, Rahaman talks about his academic journey, his dreams for the future, and the benefits of being part of a national laboratory team. To learn more about the Graduate Research Program at ORNL, visit https://education.ornl.gov/gro/.

To learn about ORISE graduate internships and fellowships, visit https://orise.orau.gov/internships-fellowships/graduates.html.

Kalidas Mainali, Ph.D., is an ORISE postdoctoral fellow at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service. He is stationed at the USDA ARS Eastern Regional Research Center in Wyndmoor, Pennsylvania, where Mainali is studying methods for creating biofuels and other valuable resources from agricultural waste. Mainali is a native of Nepal who also studied in Scotland, so he brings a wealth of world-wise experience to his research, but says that he ultimately decided to pursue his Ph.D. in the United States because of the extensive research opportunities available here. In this conversation, Mainali talks about his educational journey, his relationships with his mentors, and his plans for the future.

Jin Whan Bae is a Nuclear Reactor Analyst in the Research and Test Reactor Physics Group within the Nuclear Energy and Fuel Cycle Division at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. He was the recipient of an ORISE Mentor Award in 2024. In this episode of the ORISE Featurecast, Bae talks to host Michael Holtz about his research experience, which covers a wide range of topics related to nuclear science, including fuel cycle modeling and analysis, fission and fusion reactor physics analysis and reactor design, and machine learning applications for nuclear engineering. The conversation focuses on Bae’s educational trajectory, how he has served as a mentor and been mentored by others, and the life shift involved in moving from Korea to the United States. On the personal side, Bae shares his vision for nuclear energy as a force for prosperity without the cost of fossil fuels and carbon emissions.

The 2025-26 cohort of Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellows has begun their fellowship year in Washington, D.C. Natajsa Brown, an educator from Ocean Springs, Miss., is serving as co-host for this cohort's series of ORISE Featurecasts. In this conversation with host Michael Holtz, Brown introduces herself and what led her to apply for the AEF. As you'll hear, it's going to be a great season of conversations. Welcome, Natasja!

Peer review is evaluation of an individual or groups' work by another individual or group with expertise in the same field or a related field. Peer-reviewed work may include proposals to conduct scientific research, ongoing research, or a submitted papers based on ongoing or completed research. In this episode of the ORISE Featurecast, host Michael Holtz talks to Colleen Iversen, Ph.D., a former ORISE research participation program participant who now serves as a peer reviewer for ORISE. Their conversation covers the importance of the peer review process to the advancement of science, the newly developed ORISE Peer Review Resource Hub, the need for young investigators to become peer reviewers, and how peer review makes you a better scientist and proposal writer.