ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
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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
Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo (UWC 2024)
August 4–7, 2024
Marco Island, FL|JW Marriott Marco Island
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!
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Nuclear Science and Engineering
August 2024
Nuclear Technology
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Latest News
ARPA-E announces $40 million to develop transmutation technologies for UNF
The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy (ARPA-E) announced $40 million in funding to develop cutting-edge technologies to enable the transmutation of used nuclear fuel into less-radioactive substances. According to ARPA-E, the new initiative addresses one of the agency’s core goals as outlined by Congress: to provide transformative solutions to improve the management, cleanup, and disposal of radioactive waste and spent nuclear fuel.
A. Moisseytsev, Y. Tang, S. Majumdar, C. Grandy, K. Natesan
Nuclear Technology | Volume 175 | Number 2 | August 2011 | Pages 468-479
Technical Paper | Materials for Nuclear Systems | doi.org/10.13182/NT11-A12318
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
To improve the economic characteristics of fast reactors, researchers are developing advanced structural materials for application to reactor components. These advanced materials provide higher strength at elevated temperatures. Coupled thermal-hydraulic and structural analyses have been carried out to investigate the benefits of the advanced structural materials for a specific fast reactor design: the Advanced Burner Reactor (ABR) developed at Argonne National Laboratory. The benefits of the advanced materials, in terms of increased design margins, possible longer lifetime, thinner structures, and higher operating temperatures, were calculated for the major ABR structural components, including the reactor vessel, the core support structure, the intermediate heat exchanger, the intermediate heat transport system piping, and the steam generator. For each structure, the possible reduction in the component thickness was calculated and was converted into estimates of the commodities savings provided by the use of the advanced materials. Overall, a significant material mass saving of [approximately]40% was calculated for the considered fast reactor structures.