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The Education, Training & Workforce Development Division provides communication among the academic, industrial, and governmental communities through the exchange of views and information on matters related to education, training and workforce development in nuclear and radiological science, engineering, and technology. Industry leaders, education and training professionals, and interested students work together through Society-sponsored meetings and publications, to enrich their professional development, to educate the general public, and to advance nuclear and radiological science and engineering.
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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
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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.”
Fujio Maekawa, Ulrich von Möllendorff, Paul P. H. Wilson, Yujiro Ikeda
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 36 | Number 2 | September 1999 | Pages 165-172
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST99-A99
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The spectral neutron flux from a deuteron-beryllium neutron source, which is driven by a 19-MeV cyclotron deuteron beam and serves mainly for integral activation tests of fusion reactor structural materials, was determined by the multifoil activation method. Twenty-two selected threshold activation reactions were employed. An initial guess spectrum calculated by a Monte Carlo simulation was adjusted using the SAND-II code to be consistent with the measured reaction rates. The total neutron flux averaged over a 5 x 5 mm sample was found to be 2.52 x 1011 n/scm-2 at 10 A of deuteron beam with uncertainty of ~10%. The activation cross sections used were based on the FENDL/A-2.0 library. However, they were extrapolated beyond 20 MeV, the upper energy limit of that library, to the maximum neutron energy of 23.4 MeV and were modified where necessary. As a result, a self-consistent set of activation cross sections was obtained, which may also be used for the characterization of other neutron fields. The determined spectral neutron flux is to be used for analyses of integral activation tests of fusion reactor-relevant materials.