Years before he set foot on the MIT campus, Kieran P. Dolan participated in studies conducted at MIT's Nuclear Reactor Laboratory (NRL). As an undergraduate student majoring in nuclear engineering at the University of Wisconsin (UW), Madison, Dolan worked on components and sensors for MIT Reactor (MITR)-based experiments integral to designing fluoride-salt-cooled high-temperature nuclear reactors, known as FHRs.

Today, as a second-year doctoral student in MIT's Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, Dolan is a hands-on investigator at the NRL, deepening his research engagement with this type of next-generation reactor.