In digging deeper, O’Brien discovered the challenges of powering spacecraft - nuclear was the most viable alternative, but it had to work around extraneous radiation sources in space. O’Brien especially appreciated an independent project, assigned as part of the summer program: He chose to research nuclear-powered spacecraft. “I came away with this idea of ‘I need to go to grad school because I need to know more about this,’” he says. That summer also cemented O’Brien’s decision to attend graduate school. “After years of knowing I wanted to work in green energy but not knowing what that looked like, I very quickly fell in love with ,” he says. The American Chemical Society was soliciting student applications for summer study of nuclear chemistry in San Jose, California. It was shortly after his sophomore year, however, that O’Brien really found his way in the field of energy alternatives - in nuclear engineering. O’Brien double-majored in chemical engineering and physics and appreciated “the ability to get your hands dirty on machinery to make things work.” Deciding to begin exploring his interest in energy alternatives, O’Brien researched transition metal dichalcogenides, coatings of which could catalyze the hydrogen evolution reaction and more easily create hydrogen gas, a green energy alternative. He participated in the school’s marching band - “you show up a week before everyone else and there’s 400 people who automatically become your friends” - and enjoyed the social environment that a large state school could offer. With the idea of energy alternatives simmering on the back burner, O’Brien enrolled for undergraduate studies at the University of Arkansas. “I knew this was going to create problems down the line, I knew there’s got to be a better way to do ,” he says. When Arkansas, a place that had hardly ever seen earthquakes, started registering them in the wake of fracking in neighboring Oklahoma, it was “like a lightbulb moment” for O’Brien. “I just enjoyed understanding things on a deeper level and being able to figure out how the world works,” he says.Īt the same time, it was difficult to ignore the economics of energy playing out in his own backyard. It was one thing to mix baking soda and vinegar to make a “volcano” and quite another to understand why that was happening.
Growing up in Springdale, Arkansas as a self-described “band nerd,” O’Brien was particularly interested in chemistry and physics.
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