CRTDH
CSIR-Institute of Minerals and Materials Technology (IMMT) was established on 13.04.1964 as Regional Research Laboratory, Bhubaneswar in the eastern part of India under the aegis of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi. It was renamed in 2007 with a renewed research focus and growth strategy to be a leader in the areas of mineral & material resource engineering. The institute has expertise in conducting basic research and technology oriented programs in a wide range of subjects to address the R&D problems of mining, mineral and metals industries and ensure their sustainable development. For the last one decade, the main thrust of R&D at CSIR-IMMT has been to empower Indian industries to meet the challenges of globalization by providing advanced and zero waste process know-how and consultancy services for commercial exploitation of natural resources through the public-private-partnership (PPP) approach. Today, CSIR-IMMT is the first choice for many mineral based industries. It is also carving out a niche in processing of advanced materials for greater value addition and working on resource use efficiency of critical raw materials.
Our Expertise
The scope of the AMT Dept includes development of suitable processes for production of industrial and strategic materials using plasma technology and carrying out exploratory research in advanced materials areas. The department has developed a number of plasma processes for smelting, melting and synthesis of carbides, oxides and successfully prepared different metals, ferroalloys and composites. Various processes use ore and minerals, industrial and agricultural wastes, e-wastes, etc. to develop bench scale technology. Significant work have been carried out and pursued in areas of nanomaterials, thin films and green steel.
The Department (Central Characterization) coordinates the utilization of sophisticated instruments for rendering analytical and testing services.
The mission of this department is to perform high quality basic and technology oriented research in the frontier areas of colloids and functional materials. This department has brought scientist together with different background (ranging from physics, chemistry to metallurgy) to carry out cutting-edge inter-disciplinary research to target the underpinning problems in the area of colloids, bio-materials, energy materials, hierarchical nanostructures, polymers, functional-inorganic materials, hybrid materials and coatings.
Department is well equipped with advanced instruments needed to synthesize, characterize and measure: physico-chemical, mechanical, electrical, optical and catalytic properties etc. of such functional materials. It is also actively involved to offer short courses on colloids & materials chemistry and training courses on instrumentation.
The department developes technologies and associated products for rural industrialization and to improve quality of life in rural sector. Several lowcost technologies have been developed, propagated and commercialized by the department.
The vision of the department is to develop various need based technologies to reduce cost of energy, and pollution and to increase productivity in industrial sector in rural India.
The Department is engaged in monitoring and abatement of environmental pollution in industries, mines, urban and rural centers due to natural and anthropogenic activities. Its activities include conducting environmental impact analysis for the existing industries for their annual inventories and capacity expansion and advising them on managing their hazardous and non-hazardous wastes generated during day-to-day operations. Its activities also includes process metallurgy & solid waste utilization.
The department is engaged in developing environmental and eco-friendly technologies to exploit various primary and secondary resources employing hydro and electro-metallurgy roots. It has having expertise for preparation of pre-feasibility reports, basic engineering process packages based on the flow sheet developed and is highly equipped with all modern and sophisticated infrastructural facilities to undertake the projects on turn key basis.
The mineral beneficiation activities at IMMT, Bhubaneswar have been a part of the Minerals and Metals division since the inception of the laboratory in 1964. Following the significant changes in the scenario of mineral production and utilization in the country as a consequence of the new policy of liberalization and globalization, the recently reorganized Mineral Processing Department (formerly Mineral Processing Technology Department) re-oriented itself towards solving the R&D problems related to utilization of lean and off grade ores. The other thrust areas are energy and environmental aspects of processing different ores / minerals and development of processes for recovery of values from wastes and by products of mineral industries.