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Radiation Protection & Shielding
The Radiation Protection and Shielding Division is developing and promoting radiation protection and shielding aspects of nuclear science and technology — including interaction of nuclear radiation with materials and biological systems, instruments and techniques for the measurement of nuclear radiation fields, and radiation shield design and evaluation.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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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Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Fusion Energy Week begins today
Fusion is riding a surge of attention that began in December 2022 when researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility achieved fusion ignition. The organizers of Fusion Energy Week—a group called the U.S. Fusion Outreach Team—on the other hand, trace fusion development back 100 years to the doctoral research of Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, who discovered that stars, including our Sun, are mostly made of hydrogen and helium, which in turn led to the understanding that those elements are the “fuel” of potential fusion energy systems on Earth. In recognition of Payne-Gaposchkin’s birthday—May 10—the U.S. Fusion Outreach Team plans to hold a “grassroots celebration of fusion energy” May 6–10, 2024, and annually during the second week of May.
Jan Wallenius
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 33 | Number 4 | July 1998 | Pages 456-461
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST33-456
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Transmutation of the radiotoxic isotopes 137Cs and 129I using a muon-catalyzed fusion (CF) neutron source is considered. Extensive Monte Carlo simulations show that each fusion neutron may transmute up to 1.7 radiotoxic nuclei, depending on geometry and choice of material. Further, it is found that chemically confining cesium atoms in the compound Cs2O leads to higher transmutation efficiency for a given volume as compared with pure cesium. Assuming that a minimal requirement for applying transmutation to 137Cs is that the inventory half-life with respect to undergoing transmutation is less than twice the natural half-life T1/2 = 30 yr, the highest transmutation rate in a system consisting of a CF source with a maximum achievable intensity of 5 × 1018 n/s is ~5 kg/yr, at an inventory of 300 kg. For larger inventories, the half-life becomes longer. Hence, it seems difficult to achieve a positive energy balance in the process, in contradiction with results of a previous study.