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Fusion Energy
This division promotes the development and timely introduction of fusion energy as a sustainable energy source with favorable economic, environmental, and safety attributes. The division cooperates with other organizations on common issues of multidisciplinary fusion science and technology, conducts professional meetings, and disseminates technical information in support of these goals. Members focus on the assessment and resolution of critical developmental issues for practical fusion energy applications.
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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
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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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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.”
Jennifer S. Young, Robert H. Sherman, R. Scott Willms, Yasunori Iwai, Masataka Nishi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 41 | Number 3 | May 2002 | Pages 1131-1136
Isotope Separation | Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference on Tritium Science and Technology Tsukuba, Japan November 12-16, 2001 | doi.org/10.13182/FST02-A22760
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Cryogenic distillation is the only technique with the capacity to handle the hydrogen isotope separation requirements of a fusion power plant. However, there are safety and cost considerations associated with the considerable tritium inventory that can accumulate in such an isotope separation system (ISS). The ISS must be able to reliably produce specified products while responding to varying input streams. To design an ISS that balances all of these considerations and operate it reliably, it is essential to have a computer model of the system. This allows for a better understanding of the system and the exploration of various parameter regions that would otherwise require very expensive experimentation. The value of such a model, however, is questionable until it is validated by comparison with actual experiments. Recently, as part of the Annex IV US/Japan collaboration, a series of tests were conducted on the ISS system at the Tritium Systems Test Assembly (TSTA) located at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). This system has a fusion power plant-relevant capacity of 6 SLPM (standard liters per minute). These experiments employed light hydrogen (protium), deuterium and tritium. Conditions at five steady state conditions were measured. The measurements included concentration measurements at the column feed, top and bottom, and also at intermediate points. These measurements served as a benchmark for comparison to DYNSIM, the model that has been in use at LANL for many years.† This model was able to accurately predict the column concentration profile based on the measured pressure, temperature, reboiler heat, feed composition and flows for a set of significantly different operating conditions. These results impart confidence that the model is useful for future ISS design and for better understanding of existing system operations.