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Division Spotlight
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
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!
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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.”
Philippe Planquart, Chiara Spaccapaniccia, Giacomo Alessi, Sophia Buckingham, Katrien Van Tichelen
Nuclear Technology | Volume 206 | Number 2 | February 2020 | Pages 231-241
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2019.1637240
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The thermal-hydraulic challenges of a nuclear reactor are numerous and mastering them is crucial for the design and safety of new reactors. Numerical simulation through computational fluid dynamics (CFD) codes or system thermal-hydraulic codes can address a lot of the different questions, nevertheless the use of water modeling for the study of the thermal-hydraulic behavior of a new primary system and the validation of codes remains an extremely valuable tool. A water model of the pool-type PbBi-cooled MYRRHA reactor has been developed at the von Karman Institute in collaboration with SCK•CEN. It is a full plexiglass model at a geometrical scale 1/5 of MYRRHA. This transparent water model allows the application of optical measurement techniques like particle image velocimetry (PIV) for flow characterization. Local results of PIV measurements performed in the lower plenum at the entrance of the core are presented and compared with CFD results for nominal operating condition and a natural convection case simulating decay heat removal. Very good agreement has been found in the velocity field. The results also show the importance of the radial flow entering the core of the water model in natural convection.
