Recovering critical minerals with microbes, the process designed by AI — NSF award $3.82M (University of Alaska Anchorage)

1What "critical minerals" means

Critical minerals are those indispensable to industry or national security whose supply is concentrated in particular countries or regions. Batteries, magnets, semiconductors, wind turbines — much of modern equipment contains small quantities of metals for which there is no substitute. The problem is less the size of deposits than where the capacity to mine and refine them sits.

That is why recovery from something other than ore — waste, mine tailings, end-of-life products — becomes a research subject.

2Using microbes

Bioprocessing in the title means using the action of microorganisms or enzymes to process materials. In metal recovery, that draws on the ability of particular microbes to dissolve minerals or to take up dissolved metals selectively. Compared with refining that relies on high temperature and strong acid, it can require less energy and gentler chemistry, which is what ties it to the word sustainable.

On the other hand, microbial activity depends on temperature, pH, nutrients, and which other organisms are present, so the combinations to explore run very large. AI-driven process design appearing alongside reads as a response to that breadth.

3Alaska paired with Montana

This is the University of Alaska Anchorage's portion; the same title appears for Montana Technological University at $1,260,800, and the two together come to $5,085,375 as of 2026-09-01. Both are states with mining histories, and both sit under EPSCoR, the framework supporting regions that receive less NSF funding. It is a case where the place of the research and its subject are geographically bound together.

4Dissolve it with heat and acid, or let microbes carry it

There is more than one way to recover a metal. Conventional refining dissolves with high temperature and strong acid. Bioprocessing uses the property of certain microbes to dissolve minerals or take up dissolved metals selectively.

That last line on the right is why AI-based process design sits alongside this award. The approach has long been known while remaining a barrier to practical use, because the conditions are hard to control. A wide search space meets a tool built for searching.