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
Decommissioning & Environmental Sciences
The mission of the Decommissioning and Environmental Sciences (DES) Division is to promote the development and use of those skills and technologies associated with the use of nuclear energy and the optimal management and stewardship of the environment, sustainable development, decommissioning, remediation, reutilization, and long-term surveillance and maintenance of nuclear-related installations, and sites. The target audience for this effort is the membership of the Division, the Society, and the public at large.
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.”
Ola Thomson, Ninos S. Garis,†, Imre Pázsit
Nuclear Technology | Volume 120 | Number 1 | October 1997 | Pages 71-80
Technical Paper | Reactor Operation | doi.org/10.13182/NT97-A35432
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Detecting the vibration and impacting of neutron detectors in boiling water reactor cores is usually attempted from the detector signals. Two such indicators used or suggested earlier are the widening of the vibration peak in the detector noise auto-power spectral density and the deviation from Gaussian ( = “distortion”) of the signal amplitude probability distribution (APD). Quantification of both methods is hindered by the presence of a strong, Gaussian background; thus, it was thought that band-pass filtering around the vibration peak would improve the performance of the methods. This suggestion has been investigated. It turns out that filtering reduces the background, but it also distorts the vibration component of the signal. For good performance, this latter effect must be compensated for. Such methods are elaborated and applied to both peak widening and APD distortion techniques. It was found that application of such techniques makes the kurtosis and the decay ratio associated with the signal suitable to be used as quantitative indicators of impacting. The methods elaborated were also checked by numerical simulations and real measurements with positive results.