Incubating Market-Propelled Entrepreneurial-mindset at the Labs and Beyond (IMPEL+)

The edge of a large office building with the sky beyond, and the word "IMPEL" superimposed on it.

Expert IMPEL+ coaches provide hands-on training to develop the value proposition of early-stage building technologies R&D and its effective communication to nontechnical audiences. IMPEL+ offers a one-day pitch communication workshop in four locations across the country. The goal is to develop well-formulated, confident pitches to use toward next steps for attendees' ideas and/or technology such as pursuing public or private sector funds toward market impact. Learn more about IMPEL+ and discover the innovators and projects from the latest cohort.

JUMP into STEM

A group of people standing and facing the camera with a sign above them that says Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

JUMP into STEM is an online competition for students at U.S. colleges and universities that aims to attract innovative student teams from a variety of majors and backgrounds to the building science research profession. Winners receive paid summer internships at either Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) or at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Learn more about JUMP into STEM and review past winners from the latest and previous cohorts.

Lab-Embedded Entrepreneurship Program (LEEP)

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The Lab-Embedded Entrepreneurship Program takes top entrepreneurial scientists and engineers and embeds them within U.S. national laboratories to perform early-stage research and development (R&D) that may lead to the launch of energy or manufacturing businesses in the future. DOE created the Lab-Embedded Entrepreneurship Program to provide an institutional home for innovative postdoctoral researchers to build their research into products and train to be entrepreneurs. Programs are available at Oak Ridge, Berkeley and Argonne National Laboratories. Learn more here.

Cohort 2022: Grant Gunnison, West Gate
Cohort 2021: Tommy Gibbons, Innovation Crossroads
Cohort 2020: Sam Calisch, Cyclotron Road
Cohort 2019: Ryan Pearson and Matt Ryan, Cyclotron Road

DOE Energy I-Corps Program

Young woman wearing protective glasses and working in a lab around heavy steel equipment.

The Energy I-Corps Program pairs teams of laboratory researchers with industry mentors for an intensive two-month training where the researchers define technology value propositions, conduct customer discovery interviews, and develop viable market pathways for their technologies. Researchers return to the lab with a framework for industry engagement to guide future research.

Cohort 1: Argonne National Laboratory - Sonic LQ - Ralph Muehleisen
Cohort 1: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory – Ring Burner – Peter Therkelsen and Vi Rapp
Cohort 1: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory - C-BEST – Yining Qin
Cohort 1: Oak Ridge National Laboratory - CI-ReClad - Diana Hun
Cohort 1: Oak Ridge National Laboratory - Tunation - Joshua New
Cohort 1: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory - Sub Lambda - Kyle Alvine
Cohort 2: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory – VOLTTRON – Jeremy Haake
Cohort 3: Oak Ridge National Laboratory – MAIforBldgs – Kaushik Biswas
Cohort 4: Oak Ridge National Laboratory – Thermoelectric Dryer – Kyle Glusenkamp
Cohort 5: National Renewable Energy Laboratory – Beyond Fault Detection – Stephen Frank
Cohort 5: Idaho National Laboratory – Re-Light – Donna Baek
Cohort 6: National Renewable Energy Laboratory – GreenBlox – Dan Macumber
Cohort 9: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory – Thermastor – Spencer Dutton
Cohort 9: National Renewable Energy Laboratory – Amber LEDs – Kirstin Alberi
Cohort 11: Fermilab – EB Treement – Michael Geelhoed
Cohort 12: National Renewable Energy Laboratory – Bio-NIPU – Tao Dong
Cohort 12: National Renewable Energy Laboratory – FreeSpace Tank Team – Paul Torcellini
Cohort 12: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory – UBEM – Tianzhen Hong