Vince Lordi

February 26, 2026

What do you like about your job and/or about working at the Lab?

I enjoy the variety of the really hard problems we are able to tackle, along with the diversity of brilliant talent that resides at LLNL, enabling us to solve those important problems for our nation and society.

What is one project you’re really proud to have worked on?   

One of the first projects I worked on originated from an colleague approaching my computational team with a problem that had stagnated for years. They were trying to grow large single-crystals of extremely pure aluminum–antimonide material suitable for high-performance gamma radiation detectors. They succeeded with the growth, but the performance was significantly less than expected. We used predictive computer simulations to assess which trace impurities were causing the issues and to suggest a mitigation strategy during the growth. Within less than 2 years, we were able to make the predictions and implement a new growth process to demonstrate 10–100x improvement in performance.

What is your educational/career background? 

I have a B.S. in chemical engineering with minors in materials science and applied mathematics, an M.S. in electrical engineering, and a Ph.D. in materials science and engineering. I tried to obtain a somewhat varied education. Ironically, I originally was hired at LLNL as a physicist, a discipline for which I do not have a formal degree.

What inspired you to go into science/your field of work?           

I was interested in science and technology since a very young age and always wanted to be a scientist when I grew up. I was interested in chemistry as a child, but a very influential advisor during my undergraduate education introduced me to the interdisciplinary field of materials science and encouraged me to study it in graduate school. The rest is history.

What advice would you give to a new employee at the Lab?    

Look around as much as you can and talk to lots of people to learn what problems they work on. Learning the breadth of the Lab's work is challenging, but instrumental to a long and agile career here.

What are your hobbies/what do you do in your free time?         

I try to be a serious runner, which keeps getting harder as I get older. I also enjoy playing guitar.

How many years have you worked at the Lab?   

20

Where are you from?

New Jersey

Do you support disciplines or programs outside PLS?

Global Security, Strategic Deterrence, and Computing