Five Berkeley Lab Scientists Win DOE Early Career Awards

Researchers to pursue projects that could advance STEM capabilities

Published on Feb. 23, 2026

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Five scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have received Early Career Research Program (ECRP) awards from the Department of Energy. The ECRP program supports exceptional researchers at the outset of their careers to pursue projects that have the potential to solve scientific challenges and advance the country's STEM capabilities.

Why it matters

The ECRP awards help bolster the nation's scientific workforce by supporting promising early-career researchers who are doing formative work. The funded projects could lead to breakthroughs in areas like particle physics, geothermal energy, and neutrino research, which have broad implications for advancing scientific understanding and technological capabilities.

The details

The five Berkeley Lab awardees and their projects are: Timon Heim, who will develop a new type of particle detector for more powerful colliders; Harrison Lisabeth, who will study underground processes to improve geothermal energy systems; Daniel Carney, who will build a quantum sensor to measure small particle interactions; Callum Wilkinson, who will apply machine learning to enhance neutrino research; and Aditi Krishnapriyan, who will develop scalable machine learning methods for modeling complex phenomena.

  • The ECRP program is now in its 16th year.
  • Awards to national laboratories will be approximately $2,750,000 over five years.

The players

Timon Heim

A staff scientist in the Physics Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Harrison Lisabeth

A research scientist in the Energy Geoscience Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, focused on combining real-world experiments and AI to guide development of geothermal energy systems.

Daniel Carney

A staff scientist in the Physics Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who uses quantum information science to study particle physics and gravity.

Callum Wilkinson

A staff scientist in the Physics Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and part of the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE).

Aditi Krishnapriyan

A faculty scientist in Berkeley Lab's Applied Mathematics and Computational Research Division (AMCR) and assistant professor at UC Berkeley.

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The takeaway

The ECRP awards demonstrate Berkeley Lab's strength in cutting-edge scientific research and its ability to nurture the next generation of STEM leaders. The funded projects have the potential to yield important breakthroughs that could advance our understanding of fundamental physics, improve renewable energy technologies, and enhance data analysis capabilities across various scientific domains.