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Division Spotlight
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
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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February 2025
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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.
13th Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control & Human-Machine Interface Technologies (NPIC&HMIT 2023)
Matt Dennis is a Data Scientist at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research. Matt joined the NRC’s Accident Analysis Branch in 2021 and leads the agency’s efforts in developing and implementing the NRC Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategic Plan. He also leads data science and AI research and development projects, software development, and training which aid regulatory enhancements and reactor safety research. Additionally, Matt supports the development and maintenance of the MELCOR Accident Consequence Code System (MACCS) suite of codes and conducts severe accident consequence analyses.
Prior to joining the NRC, Matt held positions at Northrop Grumman and Sandia National Laboratories. As a Senior Reliability Engineer with the Reliability Analysis Laboratory at Northrop Grumman’s Mission Systems Baltimore, he supported sustainment efforts for Global Hawk, Triton and Phoenix unmanned aircraft systems. As a Senior Member of the Technical Staff in the Risk and Reliability Analysis department at Sandia National Laboratories, Matt led research and development projects supporting risk assessment and consequence analysis for new and operating nuclear reactors, as well as nuclear waste transportation. He has a B.S. and M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from the Missouri University of Science and Technology.
Last modified May 9, 2023, 2:21pm EDT
