Education:

• 2011 Ph.D., Physics, Columbia University, New York
• 2007 M.Phil., Physics, Columbia University, New York
• 2006 M.A., Physics, Columbia University, New York
• 2003 B.S., Physics and Astronomy, University of Washington, Seattle

About:

Ali Hanks is a Research Scientist and Lecturer in the Nuclear Engineering department at UC Berkeley. She works under Prof. Kai Vetter as a member of the radiation imaging group, mentoring graduate and undergraduate students in nuclear science research. She works with a small team of graduate students and scientists on a novel neutron detection system applying new scintillating plastics able to provide pulse-shape discrimination to separate photons and neutrons for real-time aerial imaging systems, with the potential for portions of drones to be replaced with active radiation detector components. She is also a contributor to ongoing work to expand on past work toward a cylindrical implementation of the Radiological Multi-sensor Analysis Platform for enhanced detection of nuclear materials from moving platforms.

Dr. Hanks operates as the day-to-day lead for the RadWatch and Dosenet teams and runs a summer internship program for high school students sponsored by this outreach program. She oversee a team of 5-12 undergraduates developing hardware and software for collecting radiation and environmental sensor data in the context of our outreach efforts and for scientific purposes, train these students in programming, soldering, 3D printing design, and data collection and analysis techniques. Recently, she designed and taught a new introductory course for engineering undergraduates providing hands-on experience designing, building, and using multi-sensor systems and exploring radioactivity in the environment.