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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.
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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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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.
Y. Z. Zhao, C. D. Hu, Q. L. Cui, S. H. Song, Y. H. Xie, W. Liu
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 78 | Number 5 | July 2022 | Pages 360-368
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2022.2031442
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
To explore the generation and extraction of negative ions for neutral beam injection, a prototype radio-frequency (RF)–driven negative ion source is designed at the test facility, which is under construction at the Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ASIPP). The control system provides beam pulse set up, remote supervision, plant control, timing synchronization, data management, and interlock and protection for the RF negative ion source. It plays an important role in negative ion source operation. The negative ion source prototype is currently in the development phase, involving more than 20 plant units. To match the requirements of control, data acquisition, and protection for different plant units, the plant control loop time is designed within the range of 10 μs to 100 ms, timing synchronization accuracy is 1 μs, the maximum sampling interval for data acquisition is 10 ms, the volume of data storage is tens of terabytes/year, and the interlock and protection response time is designed within the range of 10 μs to 100 ms. This paper describes the conceptual design of the control system for the prototype RF-driven negative ion source at the ASIPP, discusses the system requirements and the specifications for the control system, and shows the present status of system integration.
