a decade ago, Danielson said.

“Energy doesn’t fit their model. It takes too long,” he said. “We could have a lost generation of clean energy technology entrepreneurs when we need them the most.”

Chain Reaction Innovators aims to capture those entrepreneurs and connect them with expert researchers, world-class technology and mentorship at Argonne, near Darien in southeast DuPage County.

Argonne is the second among 17 national laboratories to offer a technology incubator after the idea got started two years ago at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California. Entrepreneurs there are working on ideas such as a device to harvest energy from ocean waves and an energy converter that creates electric current.

“We’re going to be nurturing innovation right here,” said Peter Littlewood, Argonne’s director. “I can’t wait to see what game-changing things happen with that.”

Argonne’s new incubator aims to have its first participant by this fall, said Andreas Roelofs, director of the program and of Argonne’s Nano Design Works. The program is designed to last two years, and innovators will get a salary along with funding and research help for their work.

Innovators with ideas for new ways to store wind- or solar-generated energy, new battery designs or new ways to develop sensors or detectors that can be installed in “smart” devices are the types who would be perfect for Chain Reaction Innovators, Roelofs said. These ventures match Argonne’s areas of expertise in batteries, nanotechnology and energy systems, he said.

When entrepreneurs apply starting this summer, Roelofs will play matchmaker between the ones with the best ideas and the 1,600 scientists at Argonne.

Participating innovators will have access to all the same equipment Argonne employees do.

They’ll be able to run calculations and predictions using Mira, the fifth-fastest computer in the world. They’ll also have access to the Advanced Photon Source, the brightest X-ray source in the nation. Roelofs said this can help them, for example, observe what happens inside a new type of battery while it is charged and discharged.

Innovators from across the country are invited to submit a pre-application for Chain Reaction Innovations at anl.gov/work-argonne/chain-reaction-innovations to be notified when the application process begins.