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Division Spotlight
Accelerator Applications
The division was organized to promote the advancement of knowledge of the use of particle accelerator technologies for nuclear and other applications. It focuses on production of neutrons and other particles, utilization of these particles for scientific or industrial purposes, such as the production or destruction of radionuclides significant to energy, medicine, defense or other endeavors, as well as imaging and diagnostics.
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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
Albuquerque, NM|The University of New Mexico
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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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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.”
A. M. Reda
Nuclear Technology | Volume 194 | Number 3 | June 2016 | Pages 400-405
Technical Note | doi.org/10.13182/NT15-92
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
An investigation room to interrogate packages and baggage at airports, based on a neutron-induced gamma-ray method, was designed using the MCNP5 Monte Carlo radiation transport code. A pulsed neutron generator source of interval time responses 10 μs turned on and 100 μs turned off was used for the investigation. Gamma-ray emissions in the forward, scattering angle of 90 deg, and backward directions were detected in the two cases of neutron generator (turned on/turned off). The detected data revealed that gamma rays in the forward direction have a signal-to-background ratio higher than the other positions. In addition, thermal neutron capture detected in the turned-off interval showed larger numbers of good signal-to-background ratio than that in the turned-on interval. The results show that the detection of gamma rays induced with a pulsed neutron source can be applied as a basic technique in airports to identify smuggled illicit materials.
