Robin Bullock
Montana Technological University, MT·Engineering
Rare earth elements (REEs) are metals needed for energy technologies, advanced manufacturing and defense. The U.S.
- Fields
Engineering
Microbiology & Immunology
Earth & Environmental Science
- Topics
rare earth elements
critical minerals
biomining
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Aug 2030
What they work on
- Develop an AI-based Virtual Assay that predicts which coal refuse and ash feedstocks have high potential for rare earth element recovery.
- Control microbial rare earth extraction with reinforcement-learning controllers inside a bioprocess digital twin linked to microgrid simulators, to keep the process within energy limits.
- Validate bio-metallurgical purification pathways and evaluate Shewanella oneidensis extraction against techno-economic and life-cycle metrics in a closed-loop framework.
More about the research
imports most of them, even though large domestic supplies are locked in coal mining waste. This multi-university collaboration, led by the University of Alaska Anchorage with Montana Technological University and partners, asks whether microbes guided by AI can pull these metals out of coal refuse and ash in a scalable, low-energy way.
Why it matters
Recovering rare earth elements from domestic coal waste could reduce U.S. reliance on foreign supplies for energy, manufacturing and defense technologies. A predictive, microbe-based recovery process may offer a lower-impact alternative to conventional extraction. It could also turn mining waste into a resource for mining regions in Alaska, Montana and Wyoming.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Amisha Shah
Purdue University, IN·Engineering
Measure baseline concentrations of critical metals in leachates from US municipal solid waste landfills, which are currently unknown.
Xijin Zhang
George Mason University, VA·Engineering
Design biomolecules that control how silicate minerals dissolve and re-form, using first-principles and AI-guided computational chemistry, then synthesize and genetically engineer the selected molecules.
David Moecher
University of Kentucky, KY·Earth & Environmental Science
Determine whether monazite carried by rivers from the Appalachians to the Atlantic coast comes from metamorphic rocks, granitic rocks or both, by dating detrital grains with laser-ablation split-stream mass spectrometry (LASS-ICP-MS).
The school
Montana Technological University: 1 labs on PI Pages, $23M a year on research, 3 research doctorates a year.
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