At the beginning of the week, the domestic rare earth market as a whole showed a pattern of ups and downs. Under the influence of many uncertain factors, the price trends of light and heavy rare earths were different.

Researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) announced that they observed the first net increase in fusion energy at the end of 2022 and they showed how tungsten alloys could be improved for use in advanced nuclear fusion reactors. This study could be a landmark study because the enormous energy produced by fusion could provide a carbon-neutral pathway for millions of homes and businesses. However, translating this achievement into practical nuclear energy will require innovative technologies to bring a fusion-powered society to reality.

At the beginning of the week, China’s overall domestic molybdenum market was still weak. With many positive and negative factors intertwined, the buyer's market had a relatively large advantage, mainly reflected in the continuous reduction of suppliers' quotations and no obvious increase in transaction volume. 

A research group at the Hefei Institute of Materials Science (HFIPS), Chinese Academy of Sciences, recently investigated the relationship between microstructure evolution and property degradation of two representative second-phase dispersion-reinforced tungsten alloy composites after thermal fatigue damage of electron beam thermal loading, and the related study was published in the Journal of Materials Science & Technology.