In response to a renewed international interest in molten salt reactors, researchers from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have developed a novel technique to visualize molten salt intrusion in graphite.
Warming a crystal of the mineral fresnoite, ORNL scientists discovered that excitations called phasons carried heat three times farther and faster than phonons, the excitations that usually carry heat through a material.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists recently demonstrated a low-temperature, safe route to purifying molten chloride salts that minimizes their ability to corrode metals.
Scientists at ORNL used neutron scattering to determine whether a specific material’s atomic structure could host a novel state of matter called a spiral spin liquid.