Chesapeake native to be featured on CBS science show ‘Mission Unstoppable’

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A Chesapeake native, nuclear engineer Ciara Sivels, will be featured Feb. 5 on the CBS program “Mission Unstoppable.” The series spotlights trailblazing women in science, engineering, technology and math. It is hosted by actress Miranda Cosgrove of the movies “iCarly Revival” and “Despicable Me.”

The show airs at 11:30 a.m. on WTKR-TV/Channel 3.

Sivels is a nuclear engineer at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, in Maryland.

In the show, she explains that in high school she wanted to be a chef.

She took chemistry and noticed the connection between cooking and nuclear engineering.

“In cooking, we exploit the properties of the items that we’re putting together to create our dish; in a similar way, we exploit the properties of atoms to solve problems.”

After graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sivels earned a doctorate in nuclear engineering and radiological sciences from the University of Michigan, where she was the first African American woman to graduate from what is considered the top nuclear engineering program in the United States.

Today she works on radiation transport simulations and how radiation changes materials. On “Mission Unstoppable “she will explain how radioactive particles can be found in many surprising places, such as smoke detectors, fertilizer and even bananas,” a statement from the show said.