Nuclear + Materials at ORNL
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What it is
Few considerations are more critical to nuclear energy than understanding how the extreme conditions inside fusion and advanced fission reactors affect the materials that make up those reactors. Under immense heat and bombardment by radiation, these metals, ceramics, composites and other materials change and degrade in ways that are difficult to measure and even more difficult to predict.
Why it matters
This materials challenge was an early pillar of research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory where scientists evaluated the radiation effects of materials in the historic Graphite Reactor and developed new materials, such as nickel alloys and high-chromium steels, that proved key to realizing the promise of nuclear energy. More than 80 years later, understanding of materials’ behavior in nuclear energy is still a critical need as private industry works feverishly to develop and deploy advanced fission and fusion reactor concepts to ensure a future of abundant and affordable energy.
What ORNL is doing
Starting with the fundamental physical forces at work in the neutron and advancing through computer modeling, characterization, testing, synthesis, processing and manufacturing, ORNL researchers develop a deep understanding of the forces at work on materials in extreme environments. Today, we tap into a vast reserve of knowledge, cutting-edge laboratories, and world-leading user facilities to discover, design, develop and deploy innovative materials for nuclear energy applications.
ORNL is the birthplace of materials research for fusion, with the largest fusion materials program of its kind in the world. The lab developed three of four mainstream materials used in fusion concepts being investigated by private industry. ORNL manages US contributions to the international ITER fusion project and is currently constructing the Material Plasma Exposure eXperiment, or MPEX, a next-generation facility that will explore how materials withstand plasma in fusion devices. ORNL researchers even produced the world’s first defect-free complex tungsten parts using additive manufacturing, a materials development that could have profound implications for commercial deployment of fusion energy.
What’s next
Built upon the immense knowledge developed over 80 years of research and the construction and operation of 13 nuclear reactors, ORNL’s fission materials program is also world leading. The lab’s researchers access numerous one-of-a-kind facilities such as the Low Activation Materials Development and Analysis, or LAMDA, laboratory and the Irradiated Materials Examination and Testing, or IMET, facility. These facilities, and others like them, allow researchers to develop a fundamental understanding of the properties, behavior and underlying physical mechanisms of materials in fission environments.
While fusion and fission are opposite processes, much of the materials research done at ORNL is of interest in both fields. A world-leading molten salt and liquid metal research program provides knowledge of interest to commercial ventures in both processes, while development of materials for novel detectors, modeling on supercomputers, and tools for characterizing materials at the atomic scale will be critical for realizing the future of nuclear fission and fusion in the United States.
