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
Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
Meeting Spotlight
2024 ANS Winter Conference and Expo
November 17–21, 2024
Orlando, FL|Renaissance Orlando at SeaWorld
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
Aug 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
September 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
August 2024
Latest News
Nuclear new build procurement considerations
It may seem counterintuitive, but the best time to enhance the ability to support operations and maintenance for a new plant is before construction starts. This is one of many lessons learned by the currently operating nuclear fleet. As construction and startup of many nuclear facilities was completed, it quickly became evident that the ability to efficiently support operations and maintenance was limited. Most of the information necessary to establish and manage procurement of spare and replacement items, maintenance, and configuration of the facilities was unavailable and had to be gathered on a case-by-case, “on-demand” basis. Absence of necessary information and the associated challenges resulted in the need for staff augmentation and multiyear-long projects to develop equipment bills of material and maintenance programs and to perform technical evaluations for the huge quantities of spare and replacement items being requested.
Berkan Çetinkaya, Hüseyin Tel, Ahmet Yaylı
Nuclear Technology | Volume 206 | Number 5 | May 2020 | Pages 717-727
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2019.1686939
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
(ThxCe1-x)O2 microspheres (x = 0.50, 0.75, and 0.95) prepared by sol-gel microsphere technique were compacted to pellets. The sintering kinetics, diffusion mechanism, and activation energy of the (ThxCe1-x)O2 pellets were investigated by dilatometry for 1100°C, 1200°C, and 1300°C. The rate controlling sintering method, one of the most sensitive methods, was chosen to investigate the sintering kinetics. The pellets were heated with a rate of 10°C/min and were held for 10 h at the above mentioned temperatures under isothermal conditions.
The activation energies for the (Th0.50Ce0.50)O2, (Th0.75Ce0.25)O2, and (Th0.95Ce0.05)O2 pellets were calculated as 305, 315, and 419 kJ·mol−1, respectively. In the experiments, green densities of the mixed-oxide pellets were determined as 45% to 47% of the theoretical density for all of the studied ratios. Sintering densities reached up to 94% of theoretical density after sintering at 1300°C. Scanning electron microscopy images of the pellets were taken.