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Division Spotlight
Education, Training & Workforce Development
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.
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!
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Latest News
Norway’s Halden reactor takes first step toward decommissioning
The government of Norway has granted the transfer of the Halden research reactor from the Institute for Energy Technology (IFE) to the state agency Norwegian Nuclear Decommissioning (NND). The 25-MWt Halden boiling water reactor operated from 1958 to 2018 and was used in the research of nuclear fuel, reactor internals, plant procedures and monitoring, and human factors.
Richard T. Schneider, Karlheinz Thom
Nuclear Technology | Volume 27 | Number 1 | September 1975 | Pages 34-50
Technical Paper | Education | doi.org/10.13182/NT75-A15934
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Fissioning uranium plasmas are the gaseous fuel in high-temperature cavity reactors, originally conceived for nuclear rocket propulsion in space. A predominantly pragmatic research effort, sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, has led to the determination of the most important characteristics of the uranium nuclear fireball in gaseous core reactors. For achieving thrust at a specific impulse up to 5000 sec, the nuclear fuel must bum at a temperature in excess of 10 000 K. For criticality the uranium particle density must be not less than the molecular density of gases at standard conditions, which, in combination with the high temperature, results in a uranium plasma pressure of several hundred atmospheres. The plasma is confined by a peripherally injected propellant flow, which simultaneously intercepts the thermal radiation from the nuclear fireball and provides for an effective mechanism for heat transfer. Results of extensive research indicate that the plasma core reactor scheme is feasible. In these investigations it was assumed that because of the high pressure the fissioning plasma is optically thick. It is now believed that in gases, the energy release of fissions can lead to distributions of ionized and excited states that deviate from Maxwell-Boltzmann distributions. In that case, the fissioning plasma, or gas, exists in a nonequilibrium state and is optically thin. This condition can be exploited for the direct conversion of fission fragment energy into coherent light, that is, for the nuclear-pumped lasers. In current research, the nonequilibrium conditions of fissioning plasmas and gases are emphasized, culminating in the first successful demonstrations of experimental nuclear-pumped lasers, and in a program of gaseous fuel reactor experiments with enriched uranium hexafluoride. A variety of applications of plasma core reactors and nuclear-pumped lasers is now envisioned for benefits in space and on earth. Such benefits include advanced propulsion in space, terrestrial power generation approaching 70% efficiency, the possibility of nuclear bumup of transuranium actinides wastes, and the breeding of 233U from thorium. The research on gaseous fuel reactors and nuclear-pumped lasers predominantly requires expertise in nuclear engineering, plasma, atomic, and molecular physics, and fluid mechanics and chemistry. A multidisciplinary effort is seen as a logical approach.