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From left: Suku Nair, SMU vice provost for research and chief innovation officer; Chuck Wright, corporate R&D manager at NOV; Dinesh Rajan, associate dean for faculty affairs and curriculum innovation in the Lyle School of Engineering; and Saeed Salehi, principal investigator and Herman Brown Chair in Mechanical Engineering at Lyle. [Photo: SMU]<\/p>\n
Southern Methodist University researcher Saeed Salehi will lead a $25 million project to develop a novel concept in critical-mineral mining.<\/p>\n
The U.S. Department of Energy is backing the project with $19.3 million. Researchers believe the project will create the world\u2019s first synthetic mine embedded within an advanced oil-and-gas drilling and sensing test facility.<\/p>\n
The Well-to-Mine Proving Ground project aims to repurpose a traditional well near Bryan-College Station. The well, in Navasota, would become a facility for mining critical minerals.<\/p>\n
SMU said the $19.3 million award is the largest individual funding commitment in the university\u2019s history. Private funds will cover the rest of the project\u2019s cost.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat money could have gone anywhere,\u201d Energy Secretary Chris Wright said during a recent visit to SMU. \u201cIt was competed for vigorously. But the faculty, the university leadership and the students in this room are why a large chunk of that money is going right here at SMU.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe in SMU. \u2026 We believe in the faculty. We believe in the leadership and the tremendous student body,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The award comes from the Department of Energy\u2019s Mine of the Future program. The program seeks to modernize U.S. mining practices and speed up development of the U.S. supply chain for critical minerals. The U.S. trails top producers China, Australia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, said Critical Minerals News<\/a>.<\/p>\n Moving \u2018promising innovations\u2019 from the lab to the field<\/p>\n The synthetic mine will be at Houston-based NOV Inc.\u2019s Research and Development Test Center in Navasota. The center\u2019s advanced drilling infrastructure, automated control systems and other technology support testing and validation for mining.<\/p>\n Researchers will adapt advanced oil-and-gas technology like automated drilling, fiber-optic sensing, robotics and digital twins for critical-mineral extraction. They will engineer mineral-bearing rock, place it in existing wells and test various technologies. The goal, SMU said, is to \u201cmove promising innovations from laboratory research to field-scale demonstration and commercial use.\u201d<\/p>\n Saeed Salehi is the Herman Brown chair in mechanical engineering at SMU\u2019s Lyle School of Engineering.<\/p>\n Saeed Salehi, the Herman Brown Chair in Mechanical Engineering at SMU\u2019s Lyle School of Engineering, will lead the project.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have built the best oil-and-gas industry in the U.S., and we can unleash that expertise for mining,\u201d Salehi said in a statement. \u201cThis is not something that\u2019s going to happen in the lab. It\u2019s going to go to the field, where we can test these technologies, refine them and ultimately move them toward the market.\u201d<\/p>\n Partnering with industry and teaching students<\/p>\n SMU will lead a team of industry and university partners. Their combined expertise spans subsurface engineering, drilling systems, mining, AI and digital twins.<\/p>\n \u201cProfessor Salehi\u2019s work is a powerful example of the high-impact research we are advancing at SMU,\u201d university President Jay Hartzell said in a statement. \u201cThis project highlights the role of a research university in addressing challenges of national importance.\u201d<\/p>\n The project will serve as a training ground for the next generation of engineers and mining professionals, SMU said. Students and workers will train through AI-enabled instruction, digital twin simulations and hands-on experience with drilling and mining technology. This will prepare them for careers in advanced mining.<\/p>\n \u201cOur location in the heart of North Texas places us at the intersection of academic discovery, industry leadership and entrepreneurial innovation, creating powerful opportunities to translate research into real-world impact,\u201d Rachel Mersey, SMU\u2019s executive vice president and provost, said in a statement.<\/p>\n More on the mining program and SMU research funding<\/p>\n SMU received a share of $73 million in funding from the Department of Energy\u2019s Mine of the Future initiative. Other recipients were the University of Arizona, the Missouri University of Science and Technology and Lynchburg, Virginia-based Innovative Wireless Technologies Inc.<\/p>\n In recent years, other SMU research projects have received federal funding.<\/p>\n Last year, for instance, SMU\u2019s Darwin Deason Institute for Cybersecurity<\/a> received a $2.7 million federal grant. The funding supports work identifying cyber vulnerabilities in AI- and machine-learning-powered autonomous systems.<\/p>\n Nearly four years ago, the Department of Energy awarded $2 million to SMU researchers<\/a>. That funding supported renewable energy innovations designed to improve the U.S. power grid.<\/p>\n \tR E A D\u00a0\u00a0 N E X T\t<\/p>\n![\"Saeed](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/35923D_041_Salehi.jpg\")
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