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.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 8–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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
Oct 2025
Jul 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
November 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Japan gets new U for enrichment as global power and fuel plans grow
President Trump is in Japan today, with a visit with new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on the agenda. Takaichi, who took office just last week as Japan’s first female prime minister, has already spoken in favor of nuclear energy and of accelerating the restart of Japan’s long-shuttered power reactors, as Reuters and others have reported. Much of the uranium to power those reactors will be enriched at Japan’s lone enrichment facility—part of Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd.’s Rokkasho fuel complex—which accepted its first delivery of fresh uranium hexafluoride (UF₆) in 11 years earlier this month.
T. D. Märk, M. Pahl, R. Vartanian
Nuclear Technology | Volume 52 | Number 2 | February 1981 | Pages 295-305
Technical Paper | Technique | doi.org/10.13182/NT81-A32672
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Annealing characteristics of spontaneous (fossil) and induced (recent) fission tracks in sphene were measured in a temperature range of 873 to 768 K. Results include the reduction of number density, maximum track length (horizontal projection), and average track length (horizontal projection) as a function of annealing time [up to 1.5-107 s (175 days)]. Using the track dimension method, a corrected fission track age for sphene was derived. The annealing characteristics are interpreted by means of a new annealing model, yielding information about the elementary processes governing the annealing mechanism for the etchable zone of fission tracks. Monomolec-ular recombination and the annealing of dislocation loops are proposed as the likely dominant annealing processes. Annealing coefficients α(T) obtained from the number density annealing characteristics under the assumption of a single exponential function approximation are used to derive an age-temperature relationship giving for a measured corrected fission track age in sphene the corresponding temperature . This age-temperature relationship of sphene is compared with the age-temperature relationship of apatite.
