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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.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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February 2024
Latest News
Can hydrogen be the transportation fuel in an otherwise nuclear economy?
Let’s face it: The global economy should be powered primarily by nuclear power. And it probably will by the end of this century, with a still-significant assist from renewables and hydro. Once nuclear systems are dominant, the costs come down to where gas is now; and when carbon emissions are reduced to a small portion of their present state, it will become obvious that most other sources are only good in niche settings. I mean, why use small modular reactors to load-follow when they can just produce that power instead of buffering it?
C. Koehly, L. Bühler, C. Mistrangelo
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 75 | Number 8 | November 2019 | Pages 1010-1015
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2019.1607705
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The water-cooled lead lithium (WCLL) blanket is one of the European concepts for a Demonstration nuclear fusion reactor (DEMO). The spatial distribution of the water-cooling pipes inside the liquid metal blanket breeder zone is a critical issue since efficient heat removal from the liquid metal has to be ensured, avoiding local hot spots in the fluid or in blanket walls. Convective motion, driven by density gradients due to volumetric heat sources in the liquid breeder and heat removal by cooling pipes, is affected by magnetohydrodynamic interactions of the electrically conducting lead lithium with the external magnetic field. For the recent complex design of the DEMO WCLL blanket, prediction of the liquid metal flow is quite difficult. Preliminary numerical and experimental studies are necessary to determine the flow distribution resulting from the combined interaction of electromagnetic forces, buoyancy, and pressure. A test section based on a simplified model geometry supported by preliminary numerical simulations has been designed for experiments in the MEKKA laboratory at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and is presented in this paper.