Topic Area 11 Oﬃce Hours Q&A
Q: How much will molten salt condi�ons be considered in the materials program?
A: We’re certainly interested, although it’s not as much of a focus. It’s early days, but if you havesomething innova�ve for molten salt, par�cularly for materials or oﬀ gas, absolutely.
Q: Will creep and the ASTM code qualiﬁca�on be considered more relevant than other mechanicalproper�es studies for nuclear graphite? Would a proposal on the fracture proper�es of irradiatedgraphite be a priority or not?
A: The fracture proper�es radiated graphite would probably be of some interest, not necessarily justdoing the fracture of it. I would ask is that it is, umm related heavily to the ASME probability of failure
calcula�ons that are being done at the ASME.
So how do we equate the probability of failure in the change to the probability of failure due to theirradia�on? That would probably be more along the lines of tensile strength, reduc�on or increase ofstrength, and the fracture behavior. I think just going in and doing a study on fracture behavior ofirradiated graphite is not as of interest, but if you can �e it to the ASME probability of failure, then I thinkthat would be much greater interest.
Q: Is there any interest in in-operando, speciﬁcally ion irradia�on, mechanical tes�ng to emulate
neutron irradia�on, speciﬁcally to qualify and accelerate the qualiﬁca�on of novel alloy composi�ons?
A: NEUP projects are just for 3 years’ �me, so probably we cannot aﬀord neutron irradia�on.
If we are studying radia�on damage, ion beam irradia�on is probably a good way to simulate theneutron irradia�on especially to screen or test some new composi�ons of alloys.
Q: Is there any interest beyond composi�onal screening in iden�fying stress and temperatures thatwould have desirable mechanical proper�es for long-term service?
A: Yes, of course, because we are looking for some long-term capabili�es or long term research for thematerials discovery.
If you are thinking of focusing on the exis�ng candidate materials, you need to look for some NEUP
programs working on that. If you are working on some new materials, new composi�on, or new designs
probably ﬁt this program.
Q: What is necessary to be included in the NEUP email list?
A: Send an email to NEUP@inl.gov reques�ng to be added to the list.
Q: Could you expand a litle bit on what you were referring to in terms of storage and containment.
Storage and containment of what is of par�cular interest?
A: Our par�cular interest right now is for the materials that are captured from the oﬀ gas.
Q: A follow up to the previous ques�on: So, none of the aqueous waste streams?

Not quite as much right now, but that's always of interest. If you have something that's really awesome,that looks really good and very promising, then certainly, new materials are always of interest for longterm storage.
Q: I have a ques�on about that innova�ve cladding material program. I want to get some clariﬁca�on
on what is considered a new material, for example, where like something like ODS that are not fully
qualiﬁed for cladding applica�on be considered new?
Also, would proposing novel methods of fabrica�on technologies for exis�ng materials be considered
relevant?
A: Yes, for the exis�ng materials like you men�oned, the ODS steel, if you can think about some newfabrica�on method or a technology we haven’t used to fabricate ODS, we s�ll can consider it.
Q: Would concept metallic fuel be of interest?
A: Generally, this topic is focused on materials as opposed to the fuel. So, the cladding would be ofinterest in this topic, but there's a diﬀerent topic for the fuel itself.
Q: There is a lot of interest in this innova�ve nuclear materials program. I've got one hit on Google
which is 1 slide from the gain Advanced Materials workshop last year. Could you maybe point us toany documenta�on that's got any more informa�on about this new program?
A: Last year we had two workshops, one during the ANS Summer Mee�ng Conference, then another invirtual format. You will ﬁnd all the documents about this program on the GAIN website.
So we're looking for some new ideas or new concepts for the cleaning materials development or somenew method.
Q: In topic areas 11 and 12, there seems to be overlap in terms of advanced manufacturing. If I have a
proposal idea, and I'm not sure which of these two areas would be the best ﬁt, should I contact the
program managers directly and ask?
The second ques�on is, if I think it ﬁts one area and I submit it to that area, would it be moved if
program managers think that it is a beter ﬁt for the other area?
A: There is a piece of our ini�al review process that looks over an applica�on and determines if it is a ﬁt
for the topic area. If the reviewers think it would have a beter chance in another category, we can makea recommenda�on to you as the PI to make that change. You can decline to have it moved, but we dohave those types of conversa�ons here internally to try to make sure that the applica�on is placed in thein the best topic area where it will have the poten�al to be the most successful.
If fundamentally, you're really looking at the advanced manufacturing side, and it has more of anadvanced manufacturing focus, it probably belongs in topic area 12.
The Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Road map is available on the DOE website, andI can give you more informa�on about the program as well.
Q: In terms of Topic Area 11, does the development of comprehensive frameworks include the use ofmachine learning to study whatever material system you're interested in?

A: If you're looking at machine learning as part of what you're doing, yes, but I would shy away fromsomething that is exclusively geared toward machine learning.
Q: Will ceramic materials ﬁt into this topic, such as cladding or fuels?
A: For the cladding materials, if you are working on the silicon carbide you can look at the ATF topic
areas. For other applica�ons like ceramic composite coa�ng or some applica�ons on the cladding, wewill consider this for the innova�ve nuclear materials.
Q: Is the development of stainless steel with signiﬁcantly improved stress corrosion cracking resistancein LWRs of the interest and to which topic area should it be submited?
A. This is a topic that would best align with Topic Area 11 (Advanced Nuclear Materials).
Q. Is it acceptable to submit both a NSUF 1.1+R&D, such as to NSUF 1.1 and R&D TOPIC AREA 11 on asimilar topic?
A. The same proposal cannot be submited to mul�ple Topic Areas, including the NSUF Access areas.