The Hidden Enabler of Autonomous Warfare: Advanced PCB Technologies Behind Defense AI
It’s Only Common Sense: Stay Curious, My Friends
OLI is a collaborator in the Genesis Mission, a national initiative to build the world's most powerful scientific platform to accelerate discovery, strengthen national security, and drive energy innovation.
As part of the Genesis Mission, OLI expects to provide a chemistry base supporting AI and modeling efforts for the Mission's National Security pillar to support efforts that secure critical materials such as rare earth elements essential to advanced manufacturing and defense readiness.
"Real progress requires models that reflect how chemistry behaves in real systems," said Andy Rafal, OLI's Chief Executive Officer. "That has been OLI's focus for decades."
OLI develops the industry's most advanced, accurate and validated first-principles thermodynamic and kinetic models for electrolyte and water chemistry. Because critical materials processes are complex with sparse and variable data, AI systems require a chemistry framework that keep predictions physically realistic and operationally viable. OLI provides that foundation and serves as the chemistry intelligence layer that allows hybrid AI systems to learn, predict, and guide decision making with confidence, especially when accuracy is critical and the cost of uncertainty is high.
OLI's anticipated involvement in the Genesis Mission builds on more than a decade of collaboration with the DOE. Since 2013, the company has served as a founding member of the Critical Materials Innovation Hub, where its modeling frameworks have supported research on the extraction, separation, and refining of rare earths, lithium, nickel, cobalt, and manganese from ores, brines, coal ash, produced water, and recycled electronics and batteries.
"AI has significant potential, but it must be grounded in true chemistry," said Andre Anderko, OLI's Chief Science Officer. "Our goal is to help ensure that the tools developed through Genesis reflect how chemical systems actually behave."
Leading companies across the critical-materials landscape such as Albermarle, SQM, Standard Lithium, Momentum Technologies and many others rely on OLI's models to make confident, chemistry-driven decisions that optimize process design, enhance product quality, and reduce operational risk in complex, high-pressure environments.
As the Genesis Mission moves forward, OLI expects to play a leading role in shaping the future of chemistry-informed AI. The company anticipates contributing to technical workshops, hybrid AI development, and collaborative research focused on shortening development cycles, reducing trial-and-error testing, and accelerating the shift from scientific discovery to U.S. based industrial deployment.
