The Manufacturing Science and Engineering Initiative (MSEI) is one of the five initiatives at Argonne. MSEI aims to deliver greater impact from science and technology by bringing together the many lab-wide projects that focus on the design and scale-up of new materials and their respective scale-up processes.
To foster open dialogue about new areas of research to target, the Manufacturing Initiative will host open meetings for Argonne staff the third Thursday of every other month at 3 p.m. The first meeting, Thursday, Sept. 20, 2018, will be held in Building 205, Room L101. Add to Your Calendar
Subsequent meetings will be held in Building 202, Room B169. To get on a list to receive the agenda, send a request to manufacturing@anl.gov. These meetings will include discussions of funding opportunities and new areas in which to grow new programs at Argonne. They will also provide updates on existing projects tied to the initiative and the construction of its anchor space, the Midwest Transformative Energy Manufacturing (MTEM) Research and Development (R&D) Facility.
Located adjacent to the Materials Engineering Research Facility (MERF), MTEM will provide 1,500 square feet of new collaboration work space, plus 6,000 square feet of new lab and high space for research, validation and scale up.
The first phase of the facility will open in late fiscal 2019. MTEM will have three initial goals:
- Use scientific discovery and a science-based approach to transform the process of scaling advanced materials, catalytic processes and the fabrication of high-performance devices.
- Foster public and private partnerships that can leverage Argonne’s portfolio of capabilities in discovery science, machine learning, simulation, X-ray science and new materials and chemistries.
- Explore new manufacturing approaches by integrating smart sensors, simulations and materials data to create smart, multifunctional devices. The addition of mixed and augmented reality will allow on-site and remote users to collaborate efficiently and form impactful partnerships.
Manufacturing science leverages diverse areas of the laboratory from computation, to materials design and scale up to X-ray characterization. It focuses on transformative proof-of-concept research at the early-science technology readiness level of two to four. Manufacturing science is the platform that enables the creation of advanced materials and enables smart digital manufacturing that conserves critical resources and increases supply chain resilience.
Argonne is well positioned to attract new funding by connecting with multiple agencies and industry sponsors interested in exploring the scientific underpinnings of advanced manufacturing technologies. Funding agencies with interest in technologies tied to manufacturing science include: Advance Manufacturing Office, Advanced Scientific Computing Research, Basic Energy Science, U.S. Department of Defense, National Nuclear Security Administration, Building Technologies Office, Bioenergy Technologies Office and Vehicle Technologies Office. The White House has made the advancement of next-generation manufacturing technologies a core R&D budget priority for fiscal 2020. Machine learning, artificial intelligence and autonomous systems, partnerships with industry and academia, and technology transfer and commercialization in relation to advanced manufacturing are also White House priorities.
By Tona Kunz (CPA)