Nuclear fusion experiment spots rare earths for EVs, robots, turbines and defense

A deep-tech startup’s experimental nuclear fusion system has reportedly spotted signatures of a total of 32 elements, including noble gases, rare earths, and uranium. Hyderabad-based Hylenr Technologies, which develops low-energy nuclear reactor (LENR) tech, reported the findings after more than two years of material analysis linked to its lattice confinement fusion research. The company said the results could point to a novel approach to nucleosynthesis. The process involves creating new atomic nuclei from pre-existing nucleons such as protons and neutrons, and nuclei. Hylenr officials said that the approach could provide another route to producing critical materials that largely depend on mining and geographically concentrated supply chains. “We are working toward a very different future – one in which we can engineer the material environment required to create selected elements,” Siddhartha Durairajan, Hylenr co-founder and board member, said. Nucleosynthesis usually requires extremely high temperatures and densities. Such conditions occur during the Big Bang, inside stars, and in stellar explosions, where intense shock waves produce high neutrino and neutron fluxes. This is the reason it is difficult to simulate in the lab. Meanwhile, recreating nuclear processes on Earth typically involves large facilities like nuclear reactors and particle accelerators. To tackle the issue, Hylenr designed an experimental system that relies on hydrogen-loaded metal lattices in order to form highly confined environments within solid materials. Hylenr Technologies’ elemental transmutation. Credit: Hylenr Technologies “For thousands of years, access to an element has been determined by whether nature concentrated it somewhere in the Earth’s crust,” Durairajan emphasized. He added that interactions between hydrogen, lattice defects, vacancies, and the surrounding electronic environment could create conditions that enable nuclear processes inside the material. After more than a decade of work on lattice confinement fusion technology, the company said that post-operation samples showed signatures corresponding to 32 elements. These included light and heavy elements, and noble gases such as helium, neon, and argon. It also reported signatures associated with strategically important materials, such as the rare-earth element yttrium and the actinide uranium. The team compared the results with pre-operation baseline measurements of the same catalyst material, which served as a control. A mining alternative According to the company, each reported elemental signature was corroborated with more than one independent analytical method. For the study, the scientists used analytical techniques like energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectroscopy (ICP-OES), wavelength-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (WDX), and residual gas analysis (RGA). The research team believes the technology could have broader applications apart from nuclear energy, if validated. Rare-earth elements are vital to many strategic technologies, such as EVs, robotics, wind turbines, electronics, aerospace, defense, and advanced manufacturing. “Yet their global supply chain remains highly concentrated, creating strategic dependence for countries seeking to scale clean energy, defense manufacturing and next-generation electronics,” Ram Ramaseshan, Hylenr co-founder and board member, stated in a press release. Durairajan highlighted that selected elements could one day be created through engineered nucleosynthesis rather than mined. “What makes this finding exciting is the possibility of bringing together Nuclear Fusion Energy and Rare Earth materials within one engineered nuclear platform,” he concluded. However, Hylenr’s findings are largely preliminary and have not yet been peer-reviewed. Get the latest in engineering, tech, space & science - delivered daily to your inbox.Based in Skopje, North Macedonia. Her work has appeared in Daily Mail, Mirror, Daily Star, Yahoo, NationalWorld, Newsweek, Press Gazette and others. She covers stories on batteries, wind energy, sustainable shipping and new discoveries. When she's not chasing the next big science story, she's traveling, exploring new cultures, or enjoying good food with even better wine.