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Division Spotlight
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
Meeting Spotlight
ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
Standards Program
The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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Nuclear Science and Engineering
March 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
February 2025
Latest News
Colin Judge: Testing structural materials in Idaho’s newest hot cell facility
Idaho National Laboratory’s newest facility—the Sample Preparation Laboratory (SPL)—sits across the road from the Hot Fuel Examination Facility (HFEF), which started operating in 1975. SPL will host the first new hot cells at INL’s Materials and Fuels Complex (MFC) in 50 years, giving INL researchers and partners new flexibility to test the structural properties of irradiated materials fresh from the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) or from a partner’s facility.
Materials meant to withstand extreme conditions in fission or fusion power plants must be tested under similar conditions and pushed past their breaking points so performance and limitations can be understood and improved. Once irradiated, materials samples can be cut down to size in SPL and packaged for testing in other facilities at INL or other national laboratories, commercial labs, or universities. But they can also be subjected to extreme thermal or corrosive conditions and mechanical testing right in SPL, explains Colin Judge, who, as INL’s division director for nuclear materials performance, oversees SPL and other facilities at the MFC.
SPL won’t go “hot” until January 2026, but Judge spoke with NN staff writer Susan Gallier about its capabilities as his team was moving instruments into the new facility.
Dr. Miles Leverett was a charter member of the American Nuclear Society (ANS), joining the Society in 1955. In 1960, he became the 6th president of the American Nuclear Society. He was recipient of ANS’ Standards Service Award and was the first chairman for the ANS Standards Committee.
Dr. Miles Leverett was born on December 18, 1910. He started his career at Humble Oil (now Exxon-Mobil) in 1938 to do research on mixtures of fluids. A few years later, his boss disappeared, and later called him from an undisclosed location to enlist him for a “war project”. As a result, he joined the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago in May 1942.
Dr. Leverett was subsequently assigned to the Clinton Laboratories in Oak Ridge, Tennessee to form what was ultimately the Technical Division with responsibility for the engineering design of the air-cooled, graphite moderated X-10 reactor. The purpose of this pilot plant was to demonstrate the production of Pu239 from U238 in the reactor and the chemical separation of Pu239 from U238 and fission products. The information gained guided the scale-up to the plutonium production plants in Hanford, Washington. Dr. Leverett was also involved in the engineering aspects of remotely separating Pu239 from bulk quantities of irradiated natural uranium, and in isolating Ba140 from spent natural uranium from which radioactive lanthanum was extracted for ultimate use in the final design of the bomb.
Starting in 1943, when personnel from the University of Chicago were transferred to Oak Ridge, Eugene Wigner envisioned peaceful uses for atomic energy. Thus, from the beginning, the Technical Division at Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) under Miles Leverett expended considerable effort to design a Materials Testing Reactor (MTR), which was ultimately built in a location that eventually became the Idaho National Laboratory.
In 1948, after the Atomic Energy Commission decided to concentrate all reactor work at Argonne National Laboratory, Leverett in Oak Ridge, TN returned briefly to his previous job at Humble Oil. However, in 1949, he returned to ORNL to work on an Air Force initiative to develop nuclear-powered airplanes. Dr. Miles Leverett became the technical director of Fairchild , which was managing the Air Force program.
In 1951, the Air Force replaced Fairchild with a number of contractors, and Leverett joined General Electric’s program as the manager of development laboratories and relocated to Cincinnati. In 1961, President Kennedy cancelled the ANP project. Dr. Leverett stayed with General Electric, relocated to San Francisco and eventually retired in 1976.
Dr. Leverett was also a pioneer in organizing the nuclear engineering profession. He chaired the Nuclear Engineering Committee of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) after World War II.
In 1984, he was admitted into the National Academy of Engineering. His election citation read “For pioneering contributions to nuclear reactor designs and for a broad range of contributions to the enhancement of safety in the nuclear industry.” He was also awarded several patents for his works.
He earned his BS in 1931 in chemical engineering from Kansas State, an MSE in 1932 in petroleum engineering from University of Oklahoma and a Sc.D. in chemical engineering from MIT in 1938.
Dr. Miles Leverett passed away on March 27, 2001.
Last modified January 20, 2021, 6:29am CST
