Experts from 18 Countries Discuss Research Planning for Russia's MBIR Fast Reactor International Research Center: Focusing on Closed Fuel Cycle and Mega-Science Engineering Synergy

At the Institute of Nuclear Physics of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan (INP AS RUz), the third meeting of the Advisory Council of the International Research Center (IRC MBIR), established on the basis of the Multi-purpose Fast Neutron Research Reactor (MBIR), was officially convened. The meeting attracted more than 150 expert delegates from 72 research institutions, universities, and industrial enterprises across 18 countries, including Russia, South Korea, India, the CIS, Brazil, and Africa, to jointly discuss the applied research agenda of this major scientific infrastructure.

Stepan Kalmykov, Vice President of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) and Chairman of the Advisory Council, pointed out in his opening address that the MBIR fast reactor, as a core component of the global Mega-Science facility landscape, is of decisive significance for advancing the Closed Nuclear Fuel Cycle (CNFC), minimizing Radioactive Waste (RAW), and broadening the global fissile nuclear energy resource base. Kalmykov emphasized that nuclear science and technology innovation is an engine driving multidisciplinary collaborative development, and multilateral dialogue between the transnational academic and industrial communities will help establish global advanced reactor development standards for decades to come.

Evgeny Abakumov, Deputy Director General for Science and Strategy of Rosatom, stated that the holding of the Advisory Council meeting in Tashkent confirms that MBIR has evolved from a regional priority project into an international gravitational field attracting cutting-edge nuclear physics ideas from around the world. Shavkat Ayupov, President of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan, and Ilkham Sadykov, Director of the Institute of Nuclear Physics, also noted that the MBIR project has natural complementarity with Uzbekistan's upgraded VVR-SM research reactor and cyclotron cluster, and that both sides have broad cooperation opportunities in applied science fields such as radiation-resistant material testing, benchmarking and validation of numerical computation codes, and medical radioisotope production.

Mikhail Kovalchuk, Director of the National Research Center at the Kurchatov Institute, pointed out in a written address that the MBIR fast neutron research reactor and the operational PIK high-flux steady-state thermal neutron reactor together constitute a Mega-Science research matrix covering the full energy spectrum of neutron fluxes, serving as a key cornerstone for ensuring technological sovereignty and fostering breakthrough technologies. He proposed building a unified research program and called on CIS member states to deeply integrate into relevant scientific cooperation.

Vasily Konstantinov, CEO of the IRC MBIR Consortium, introduced a new vision for the facility platform. He proposed that, building on the MBIR engineering design, future derivative development of Small Modular Reactor (SMR) units is expected; given that most of the thermal energy generated by MBIR will be converted into approximately 50 megawatts of electrical output, the reactor itself can serve as a demonstration platform for future advanced fast reactor projects. In addition, the project will introduce artificial intelligence algorithms throughout the entire process, empowering all stages from core irradiation scheme design to test result analysis.

MBIR is a sodium-cooled fast neutron multi-purpose research reactor (Sodium-Cooled Fast Reactor, SFR) with a thermal power of 150 Megawatt Thermal (MWt), located at the Research Institute of Atomic Reactors (NIIAR) site in Dimitrovgrad, Russia, and is a core project of Russia's national science and technology program "Advanced Nuclear Energy and Energy Technologies." The project is currently advancing the primary circuit main process installation in full swing: following the 2025 completion of positioning the cold filter-trap of the emergency residual heat removal system, welding of primary circuit hot piping and pressure vessel nozzles, and installation of the main sodium tank equipment, in 2026 two emergency heat exchangers, each weighing 7.3 tonnes, 5 meters tall, and 1.5 meters in diameter, have been successfully hoisted into place, paving the way for accelerating the research and development of Generation IV Nuclear Energy Systems and dual-component nuclear energy systems.