1951-1953

Prepared for establishment of IMR by the of Sciences

 1953

Appointmented Prof. Li Xun as IMR director by Premier Zhou Enlai

1953-1957

Served the major task of the recovery and development of 's iron and steel industry. Research fields: physical chemistry of metallurgy, metals processing, ore dressing, refractory materials and chemical analysis

1957-1966

Pay equal emphasis on both the state task and fundamental research, opening up research fields in supperalloys, refractory metals, and cermets

1970-1977

Subordinated to Ministry of Metallurgical Industry

1978－now

Subordinated to the of Sciences

1982-1999

Established the and Protection of Metals by merging some related laboratories from both the IMR and the Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, CAS

1985-1993

Established the Laboratory of Atomic Imaging of Solids, the State Key Laboratory of Fatigue and Fracture of Materials, the State Key Laboratory of　Rapidly Solidified Nonequilibrium Alloys, and the State Key Laboratory for Corrosion and Protection of Metals

1995

Setup of the for High Performance Homogenized Alloys

1996

Setup of the for Corrosion Control of Metals

1999

The new IMR formed by merging with ICPM, becoming the Northeast Research and Development Base of High Performance Materials sponsored by the KIP of CAS

2001

Established National Laboratory of Materials Science

2002

Established advanced material R&D center, for Interfacial Materials