Leadership

Kawtar Hafidi is the associate laboratory director for Physical Sciences and Engineering. She oversees five Argonne research divisions and two U.S. Department of Energy user facilities conducting fundamental and applied research in nuclear and high energy physics, materials science, chemical science and engineering, and nanoscience and technology.

Ilke Arslan is the deputy associate laboratory director and senior science advisor for Physical Sciences and Engineering at Argonne National Laboratory.

Jim Grudzinski is the directorate operations officer for Argonne’s Physical Sciences and Engineering (PSE) directorate. He leads strategic and tactical operational and administrative efforts in support of PSE’s programmatic mission.

Katrin Heitmann is the interim director of the High Energy Physics division at Argonne National Laboratory. She is also a physicist and computational scientist, and a senior member of the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics at the University of Chicago, as well as a member of the Northwestern-Argonne Institute of Science and Engineering.

Gregory Herman is the director of the Chemical Sciences and Engineering division at Argonne National Laboratory.

Zein-Eddine Meziani is the interim director of the Physics division at Argonne National Laboratory and an Argonne Distinguished Fellow.

Charudatta ​“CD” Phatak is the interim director of the Materials Sciences division at Argonne National Laboratory.

Venkat Srinivasan is a senior scientist at Argonne and serves as director of the Argonne Collaborative Center for Energy Storage Science (ACCESS), director of the Low-cost Earth-abundant Na-ion Storage (LENS) consortium, and lead for external engagement for the Energy Storage Research Alliance (ESRA). He previously served as deputy director of the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR), from 2012 to 2023, and as director from 2023 until the conclusion of its work in 2024. Venkat is a former staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he held multiple leadership roles. His research interest is in developing next-generation batteries for use in vehicle and grid applications.

Gary Wiederrecht is the director of the Center for Nanoscale Materials and the Nanoscience and Technology division at Argonne National Laboratory. 

Diana Anderson leads communications for the Physical Sciences and Engineering directorate at Argonne National Laboratory, including five research divisions, two national scientific user facilities and hundreds of research partners.

Gemma Cutinello leads executive administrative support for the Physical Sciences and Engineering directorate at Argonne National Laboratory.

Urs Geiser is currently the Directorate Safety Manager for the Physical Sciences and Engineering directorate. His group of deployed environment, safety and health coordinators serves the five divisions in the directorate. He is a Ph.D. level materials chemist with 20 years of research experience.

Melissa McCorvey is the Administrative and Operations Support Manager for the Physical Sciences and Engineering directorate at Argonne National Laboratory.

Dan Pierce is the Human Resources Manager for Physical Sciences and Engineering at Argonne National Laboratory.

Corby Schmitz is the information technology manager for Physical Sciences and Engineering (PSE) at Argonne, supporting scientific research and engagement with central IT to provide the best experience for users within the PSE directorate.