Ab Audio Interview with Dr. Alexander Dunaevsky, Director of Accelerator Physics at Tri-Alpha Technologies.

It was lovely to catch up with Alexander Dunaevsky at the TRIUMF hosted, “International Meeting of the Union for Compact Accelerator-driven Neutron Sources (UCANS11), February 24-28, 2025, in North Vancouver, BC, Canada.

I very much enjoy discussing entrepreneurial ideas in the particle accelerator field with Alexander.  At any given time we both usually have a few new potential pre-commercialization R&D ideas, or proto-types ready to launch towards commercialization.  We share potential investors, customers, technical ideas, links to technical experts, business strategies, and/or market assessments over a glass of wine, a cup of coffee, or a nice meal.  It is fun, and interesting!

The link to the audio interview follows, and below the link are time stamps for each question, and a few words towards Alexander’s answer in the interview for reference.

Question 1 (00:00): What is your current role?

I am Director of Accelerator Physics at Tri-Alpha Technologies. It’s a parent company for several subsidiaries …. including one involved with Boron Neutron Capture Therapy (BNCT).

Question 2 (01:27): What is your entrepreneurial toolkit?

Foremost, physicists who work for industry need to be open to new ideas, and different technologies …

Question 3 (03:18): What is an example from your career?

Alexander shares an example from the days of the USSR …..

Question 4 (06:45): What was the specific entrepreneurial idea?

We developed a dental x-ray system that would deliver ten times lower radiation dose to the patient … important for children, in particular …

Question 5 (08:30): But people didn’t want to buy it?

Yes, people didn’t want to buy it, but one company wanted to buy it to eliminate a competitive technology …

Question 6 (09:46): What was the lesson?

It was too disruptive. It was too big of a step.

Question 7 (12:48): Is there anything from when you were a child such as characteristics that you see in yourself today, or other anecdotes you would like to share?

Alexander’s answer is related to some parental guidance!

Thank you very much for your time, Alexander.  I consider you a mentor, and I am always fascinated by your vision and next ideas.  It was a real pleasure to see you again, and I look forward to the next time.