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
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
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.”
Yoshihisa Nishi, Nobuyuki Ueda, Izumi Kinoshita, Ehud Greenspan
Nuclear Technology | Volume 152 | Number 3 | December 2005 | Pages 324-338
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT05-A3680
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The encapsulated nuclear heat source (ENHS) is a modular reactor that was selected by the 1999 U.S. Department of Energy Nuclear Energy Research Initiative program as a candidate Generation IV reactor concept. It is a fast neutron spectrum reactor cooled by lead-bismuth eutectic using natural circulation. One of the unique features of the ENHS is that the fission-generated heat is transferred from the primary coolant to the secondary coolant through rectangular intermediate heat exchanger (IHX) channels. The decay heat is removed by the reactor vessel auxiliary cooling system (RVACS).Events of protected loss of heat sink (PLOHS) and unprotected transient overpower (UTOP) have been analyzed for the ENHS using the CERES transient simulation code for liquid-metal-cooled reactors.It is found that the ENHS core is sufficiently cooled by the RVACS under the PLOHS condition. The core flow rate is affected by the growth and disappearance of temperature stratification in the primary plenum. It is also found that even under the inconceivable UTOP event considered, the ENHS reactor core is not catastrophically damaged. This is due to negative reactivity feedback from the radial expansion of the core, the grid plate, and the Doppler effect. The use of high-performance ferritic steel instead of HT-9 and proper design of the reactor control system could provide large safety margins against cladding damage.