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
Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
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.”
R. H. Fowler, Robert N. Morris, James A. Rome
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 20 | Number 2 | September 1991 | Pages 200-207
Technical Paper | Plasma Heating System | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A29690
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Neutral beam injection into the Advanced Toroidal Facility (ATF) is studied using Monte Carlo methods. The detailed geometry of ATF to properly calculate aperture, shine-through, orbit, and charge-exchange losses, as well as the net plasma heating, is included. Also, the beam geometry (including the source geometry), beam divergence, and focusing are carefully modeled. The dependence of plasma heating on the injection angle is determined. The results indicate that net plasma heating is lower for perpendicular injection than for tangential injection because of large orbit and charge-exchange losses. However, this difference is partially offset by the need to use a smaller aperture during tangential injection to prevent excessive heating of the vacuum vessel. Shine-through losses are significant for low-density perpendicular injection.