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.
Division Spotlight
Thermal Hydraulics
The division provides a forum for focused technical dialogue on thermal hydraulic technology in the nuclear industry. Specifically, this will include heat transfer and fluid mechanics involved in the utilization of nuclear energy. It is intended to attract the highest quality of theoretical and experimental work to ANS, including research on basic phenomena and application to nuclear system design.
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
May 2025
Nuclear Technology
April 2025
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
General Kenneth Nichols and the Manhattan Project
Nichols
The Oak Ridger has published the latest in a series of articles about General Kenneth D. Nichols, the Manhattan Project, and the 1954 Atomic Energy Act. The series has been produced by Nichols’ grandniece Barbara Rogers Scollin and Oak Ridge (Tenn.) city historian David Ray Smith. Gen. Nichols (1907–2000) was the district engineer for the Manhattan Engineer District during the Manhattan Project.
As Smith and Scollin explain, Nichols “had supervision of the research and development connected with, and the design, construction, and operation of, all plants required to produce plutonium-239 and uranium-235, including the construction of the towns of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Richland, Washington. The responsibility of his position was massive as he oversaw a workforce of both military and civilian personnel of approximately 125,000; his Oak Ridge office became the center of the wartime atomic energy’s activities.”
S. I. Abdel-Khalik, L. Crosatti, D. L. Sadowski, S. Shin, J. B. Weathers, M. Yoda, ARIES Team
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 54 | Number 3 | October 2008 | Pages 864-877
Technical Paper | Aries-Cs Special Issue | doi.org/10.13182/FST08-A1907
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper describes a numerical and experimental investigation in support of the ARIES-CS divertor design, which selected a modular, helium-cooled, T-tube design that can accommodate a peak heat load of 10 MW/m2. Numerical analyses were carried out using the FLUENT computational fluid dynamics software package to evaluate the thermal performance of the divertor at the nominal design and operating conditions. Sensitivity studies were also performed to determine the effect of variations in geometry and operating conditions resulting from manufacturing tolerances and/or flow maldistribution between modules. The results indicate that the selected design is "robust" with respect to such anticipated variations in design and operational parameters and that a peak heat flux of 10 MW/m2 can be accommodated within the constraints dictated by material properties. Extremely high heat transfer coefficients [>40 kW/(m2K)] were predicted by the numerical model; these values were judged to be "outside the experience base" for gas-cooled engineering systems. Hence, an experimental investigation was undertaken to verify the results of the numerical model. Variations of the local heat transfer coefficient within an air-cooled, geometrically similar test module were measured at the same Reynolds number as the actual helium-cooled divertor. Close agreement between the model predictions and experimental data was obtained. The results of this investigation provide added confidence in the results of the numerical model used to design the ARIES-CS divertor and its applicability to other gas-cooled high-heat flux components.