Graduate student Brandon Distler has a cool idea about chilling the core of nuclear reactors.

While water is what cools the core of a conventional nuclear reactor, Distler, a grad student in UMR's nuclear engineering program, says salt would be a better alternative in some advanced reactor designs. The federal Energy Department thinks his idea has merit and has granted Distler a fellowship to study it further.

Distler is one of only a dozen graduate students to receive the fellowship this year through the DOE’s Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative. (Full story.)

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