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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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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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Empowering the next generation: ANS’s newest book focuses on careers in nuclear energy
A new career guide for the nuclear energy industry is now available: The Nuclear Empowered Workforce by Earnestine Johnson. Drawing on more than 30 years of experience across 16 nuclear facilities, Johnson offers a practical, insightful look into some of the many career paths available in commercial nuclear power. To mark the release, Johnson sat down with Nuclear News for a wide-ranging conversation about her career, her motivation for writing the book, and her advice for the next generation of nuclear professionals.
When Johnson began her career at engineering services company Stone & Webster, she entered a field still reeling from the effects of the Three Mile Island incident in 1979, nearly 15 years earlier. Her hiring cohort was the first group of new engineering graduates the company had brought on since TMI, a reflection of the industry-wide pause in nuclear construction. Her first long-term assignment—at the Millstone site in Waterford, Conn., helping resolve design issues stemming from TMI—marked the beginning of a long and varied career that spanned positions across the country.
Masahiro Ueta, Masakazu Ichimiya, Hiroshi Hirayama, Masayuki Asano, Hisaaki Ikeuchi, Katsuhisa Sekine, Tetsuhiko Kodama, Kenichiro Sato
Nuclear Technology | Volume 100 | Number 1 | October 1992 | Pages 1-12
Technical Paper | Fission Reactor | doi.org/10.13182/NT92-A34749
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The core support structure of a fast breeder reactor supports the fuel assemblies, supplies sodium coolant to the fuel assemblies, and maintains the insertability of control rods even during an earthquake. The core support structure is designed as a box fabricated of welded plates, ribs, and cylinders that distribute the load in a diverse manner, in order to reduce the weight and to fulfill safety-related functions. This box structure was not adopted in the Monju prototype reactor; thus, a method to evaluate the structural integrity of this structure must be developed. To prepare design guidelines, structural integrity was studied in accordance with the requirements and features of the box structure. This study consisted of the evaluation of crack propagation under loadings on cracks with hypothetical dimensions as well as an ordinary structural design method. To clarify the crack propagation behavior, partial-scale model tests were conducted that simulated typical core support structure parts. From the results of these experiments, the crack growth rate was evaluated and incorporated into the structural integrity evaluation method. Finally, the structural integrity of the core support structure of the Japanese demonstration reactor is evaluated by this method.