Katie Yurkewicz is the interim Chief Communications Officer and Senior Director of Communications and Public Affairs at Argonne. She also serves as the lab’s Head of Scientific and Technical Communications. As interim Chief Communications Officer, Katie ensures that internal and external audiences understand Argonne’s mission and how the lab’s science and technology changes the world for the better.

Katie has spent the last two decades working in the field of science communication, based out of two U.S. Department of Energy national laboratories and the CERN laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland. She has more than a decade of experience leading multifunctional communications teams in strategic communications planning and execution for large science organizations.

Originally trained as a nuclear physicist, Katie has experience across the communications spectrum, from science writing and media relations to public speaking and event organization. She has conducted communication trainings for scientists and graduate students, presented on effective communications at scientific meetings and conferences, and co-led the international Interactions collaboration of particle physics communications professionals for eight years.

Katie previously served as the Head of Events and Protocol at Argonne, where she led strategy, planning and execution for VIP visits, special events, conferences and tours. Prior to joining Argonne, Katie spent 13 years working in science communications at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, where she started as founding editor of an online publication about advanced computing for science, served for four years as the U.S. communications specialist at the CERN laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland, and then spent eight years leading Fermilab’s external and internal communications activities as the laboratory’s Head of Communications.

Katie holds a Ph.D. in nuclear physics from Michigan State University, and bachelor’s degrees in physics and dance from Smith College.