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
Nuclear Criticality Safety
NCSD provides communication among nuclear criticality safety professionals through the development of standards, the evolution of training methods and materials, the presentation of technical data and procedures, and the creation of specialty publications. In these ways, the division furthers the exchange of technical information on nuclear criticality safety with the ultimate goal of promoting the safe handling of fissionable materials outside reactors.
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
First astatine-labeled compound shipped in the U.S.
The Department of Energy’s National Isotope Development Center (NIDC) on March 31 announced the successful long-distance shipment in the United States of a biologically active compound labeled with the medical radioisotope astatine-211 (At-211). Because previous shipments have included only the “bare” isotope, the NIDC has described the development as “unleashing medical innovation.”
Anil Kumar, Yujiro Ikeda, Mahmoud Z. Youssef, Mohamed A. Abdou, Yoshitomo Uno, Hiroshi Maekawa
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 30 | Number 3 | December 1996 | Pages 1118-1128
Neutronics Experiments and Analyses | doi.org/10.13182/FST96-A11963099
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The work reported herein was conducted in response to an ITER Task to demonstrate experimentally that pulsed and continuous operations of a D-T neutron source lead, in general, to differing impacts on inventory of induced radioactivity, on one hand, and to verify calculational methods, on the other. In a series of experiments conducted for the purpose, half lives of observed radioisotopes varied from 1 minute (25Na) to 271 days (57Co). Relatively short pulse lengths, 1 minute to 3 minute duration, were chosen. A pneumatic transport system was employed to transport foils of niobium, iron, aluminum. vanadium, nickel, and magnesium for irradiation close to the D-T neutron source. Three duty factors and two kinds of power levels were used for various neutron pulse trains.
The experimental data was processed to obtain ratio of inventories in pulsed to continuous operation scenarios for each of the observed radioisotope. We observe a large reduction in radioactive inventories for values of t1/2/p (half life/pulse duration) lying in the range of 1 to 10. Interestingly, random power pulse trains show even larger reduction in radioactive inventory: the ratio of inventories drops to ~0.14 for t1/2/p = 3.15 (27Mg) for a duty factor of 20% and a train of 10 pulses, whereas it would have hit a minimum of 0.33 for t1/2/p = 3.53 for constant power level.