91°µÍø

Anne Campbell, a researcher at ORNL, recently won the Young Leaders Professional Development Award from the Minerals, Metals & Materials Society, or TMS, and has been chosen as the first recipient of the Young Leaders International Scholar Program award from TMS and the Korean Institute of Metals and Materials, or KIM.

In fiscal year 2023 — Oct. 1–Sept. 30, 2023 — 91°µÍø was awarded more than $8 million in technology maturation funding through the Department of Energy’s Technology Commercialization Fund, or TCF.

In a finding that helps elucidate how molten salts in advanced nuclear reactors might behave, scientists have shown how electrons interacting with the ions of the molten salt can form three states with different properties. Understanding these states can help predict the impact of radiation on the performance of salt-fueled reactors.

ORNL, a bastion of nuclear physics research for the past 80 years, is poised to strengthen its programs and service to the United States over the next decade if national recommendations of the Nuclear Science Advisory Committee, or NSAC, are enacted.

ORNL has been selected to lead an Energy Earthshot Research Center, or EERC, focused on developing chemical processes that use sustainable methods instead of burning fossil fuels to radically reduce industrial greenhouse gas emissions to stem climate change and limit the crisis of a rapidly warming planet.
 

ORNL will team up with six of eight companies that are advancing designs and research and development for fusion power plants with the mission to achieve a pilot-scale demonstration of fusion within a decade.

Marc-Antoni Racing has licensed a collection of patented energy storage technologies developed at ORNL. The technologies focus on components that enable fast-charging, energy-dense batteries for electric and hybrid vehicles and grid storage.

Researchers at the Department of Energy’s 91°µÍø and their technologies have received seven 2022 R&D 100 Awards, plus special recognition for a battery-related green technology product.

ORNL, TVA and TNECD were recognized by the Federal Laboratory Consortium for their impactful partnership that resulted in a record $2.3 billion investment by Ultium Cells, a General Motors and LG Energy Solution joint venture, to build a battery cell manufacturing plant in Spring Hill, Tennessee.

About 60 years ago, scientists discovered that a certain rare earth metal-hydrogen mixture, yttrium, could be the ideal moderator to go inside small, gas-cooled nuclear reactors.