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Members are devoted to applying nuclear science and engineering technologies involving isotopes, radiation applications, and associated equipment in scientific research, development, and industrial processes. Their interests lie primarily in education, industrial uses, biology, medicine, and health physics. Division committees include Analytical Applications of Isotopes and Radiation, Biology and Medicine, Radiation Applications, Radiation Sources and Detection, and Thermal Power Sources.
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April 3–5, 2025
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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.
G. D. Loesser, C. S. Pitcher, R. Feder, D. Johnson, S. Pak, M. Walsh, Y. Zhai
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 64 | Number 2 | August 2013 | Pages 156-160
ITER | Proceedings of the Twentieth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (TOFE-2012) (Part 1), Nashville, Tennessee, August 27-31, 2012 | doi.org/10.13182/FST12-558
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The ITER Diagnostic Division is responsible for designing and procuring the First Wall Blankets that are mounted on the vacuum vessel port plugs at both the upper and equatorial levels. This paper will discuss the effects of the diagnostic aperture shape and configuration on the coolant circuit design. The Diagnostic First Wall (DFW) design is driven in large part by the need to conform the coolant arrangement to a wide variety of diagnostic apertures combined with the more severe heating conditions at the surface facing the plasma, the First Wall (FW). At the FW, a radiant heat flux of 35W/cm2 combines with approximate peak volumetric heating rates of 8W/cm3 (equatorial ports) and 5W/cm3 (upper ports). Here at the FW, a fast thermal response is desirable and leads to a thin element between the heat flux and coolant. This requirement conflicts with the desire to have a thicker FW element to accommodate surface erosion and other off-normal plasma events.