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 Nonproliferation Policy
The mission of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Policy Division (NNPD) is to promote the peaceful use of nuclear technology while simultaneously preventing the diversion and misuse of nuclear material and technology through appropriate safeguards and security, and promotion of nuclear nonproliferation policies. To achieve this mission, the objectives of the NNPD are to: Promote policy that discourages the proliferation of nuclear technology and material to inappropriate entities. Provide information to ANS members, the technical community at large, opinion leaders, and decision makers to improve their understanding of nuclear nonproliferation issues. Become a recognized technical resource on nuclear nonproliferation, safeguards, and security issues. Serve as the integration and coordination body for nuclear nonproliferation activities for the ANS. Work cooperatively with other ANS divisions to achieve these objective nonproliferation policies.
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.”
Benjamin M. Ma, Glenn Murphy
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 20 | Number 4 | December 1964 | Pages 536-546
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE64-A20997
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The strain and stress distributions resulting from the combined effects of radiation, creep, and neutron flux levels in long externally and internally cooled tubular reactor fuel elements are determined analytically. Primary effects of thermal-cycling growth, irradiation growth, swelling, and creep of the fuel materials under operating conditions of power reactors are taken into consideration. An exact solution of the modified Bessel functions and an approximate solution (using a parabolic function) for neutron flux distribution are obtained from the simple diffusion equations. From the relation that the rate of heat generation is proportional to the neutron flux, the rate of volumetric heat generation in the fuel is found. Then the temperature distribution in the fuel is determined by using Poisson's equation of heat conduction. The equations of the displacement-strain relations, compatibility, incompressibility, stress equilibrium, yield criterion, and boundary conditions are established from some basic assumptions. The strain and stress equations for the fuel elements are derived. From the calculated results of a numerical example, the neutron flux levels, thermal and radiation dilatation, irradiation creep, thickness, and properties of the cladding material are found to have significant influences on the strain and stress distributions produced in the fuel element.
