ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Sep 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
September 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
October 2025
Latest News
Empowering the next generation: ANS’s newest book focuses on careers in nuclear energy
A new career guide for the nuclear energy industry is now available: The Nuclear Empowered Workforce by Earnestine Johnson. Drawing on more than 30 years of experience across 16 nuclear facilities, Johnson offers a practical, insightful look into some of the many career paths available in commercial nuclear power. To mark the release, Johnson sat down with Nuclear News for a wide-ranging conversation about her career, her motivation for writing the book, and her advice for the next generation of nuclear professionals.
When Johnson began her career at engineering services company Stone & Webster, she entered a field still reeling from the effects of the Three Mile Island incident in 1979, nearly 15 years earlier. Her hiring cohort was the first group of new engineering graduates the company had brought on since TMI, a reflection of the industry-wide pause in nuclear construction. Her first long-term assignment—at the Millstone site in Waterford, Conn., helping resolve design issues stemming from TMI—marked the beginning of a long and varied career that spanned positions across the country.
Dr. Thomas L. Sanders joined the American Nuclear Society (ANS) in 1987, joining the Fuel Cycle and Waste Management, Nuclear Criticality and Nuclear Nonproliferation Divisions. Since the start of his membership at ANS, he has served as Vice President, President, and Board Executive.
Currently, he is the Associate Laboratory Director for Clean Energy Initiatives at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL), operated by Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS), LLC, where he is responsible for developing new opportunities in energy technology development.
Dr. Sanders is a recognized expert on international relations and has been working on rebuilding the U.S. nuclear export industry through the development of small modular. Prior to working at SRNL, he spent 27 years at Sandia National Laboratory (SNL).
He was appointed to a second term on the Civil Nuclear Trade Advisory Committee (CINTAC), which serves the Secretary of Commerce on trade issues facing the U.S. civil nuclear industry. Additionally, Dr. Sanders was selected as a U.S. member of Russian President Medvedev’s Global Energy Prize Committee and was the cofounder and former Vice President of the American Council on Global Nuclear Competitiveness (ACGNC).
His many accomplishments include testifying to Congress, the Blue Ribbon Commission, and Secretarial Officers from DOE, the Departments of State and Defense, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), and other agencies. He also developed a complementary partnership initiative between seven U.S. and nine Russian Lab Directors.
Dr. Sanders earned a BS, MS and PhD from the University of Texas – Austin in Nuclear Engineering. He has authored more than 100 journal articles and papers on subjects from fusion and fast fission breeder reactor systems, to criticality safety of spent fuel transport, storage, and disposal systems. He is a member of ACGNC, American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management.
He also served as a nuclear operator and supervisor on U.S. Navy nuclear submarines.
Read Nuclear News from July 2009 for more on Thomas.
