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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 8–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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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Latest News
Ho Nieh, TVA board members, and nuclear fuel recycling bill head to Senate floor
Nieh
Ho Nieh, the Trump administration’s nominee to be a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and four new board members of the Tennessee Valley Authority were approved in a vote today by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and head to the Senate floor for a final vote.
The committee also voted to advance to the Senate floor the Nuclear REFUEL Act of 2025 (S. 2082), which would smooth the regulatory pathway for recycling used nuclear fuel.
President Donald nominated Nieh on July 30 to serve as NRC commissioner for the remainder of a term set to expire June 30, 2029, which was held by former NRC commissioner Chris Hanson, who Trump fired in June.
2025 International Conference on Accelerator Applications (AccApp'25)
Abstract: Creating a controlled fusion reaction that produces more energy than supplied to initiate it (i.e. target gain >1) is a grand scientific challenge with broad societal implications. A significant barrier for every approach pursuing this goal is to create plasma conditions which exceed Lawson's criteria, where the power of fusion self-heating exceeds all the power losses of the system, to the point where target gain >1 is achieved. After decades of research and technological advances, the first laser indirect-drive inertial confinement fusion experiment to meet the Lawson Criteria and achieve a target gain >1 was performed.
This talk will discuss both the key scientific and technological advances that enabled fusion ignition via the inertial confinement approach and the future research directions across a broad range of areas needed to realize Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE).
Additional detail will be given on key nuclear and x-ray observations used to identify the principal sources of fusion yield variability that can arise from variations in target quality and implosion drive asymmetry. The principal scalings, tradeoffs, and design evolutions required to achieve the higher energy gains required for realizing an integrated IFE community test facility will be discussed. Initial findings from recent experiments seeking to increase target gain from ICF experiments will also be presented.
Dr. Arthur Pak is the Lead for Strategic Development for the Inertial Confinement (ICF) Program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the Associate Director for Strategy of the Livermore Institute for Fusion Technology (LIFT). Arthur is focused on further developing inertial fusion for economic, energy, and national security. Since joining the National Ignition Campaign at LLNL in 2011, Arthur has held several positions within the ICF program, including leading experimental campaigns and analysis working groups that achieved fusion ignition in 2022. His research has focused on using experimental measurements, together with analytic models and detailed simulations to understand and mitigate the principal mechanisms that inhibited fusion ignition. Arthur received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California, Davis in Optical Science Engineering, and his Ph.D from the University of California, Los Angeles in Plasma Physics.
Last modified September 18, 2025, 8:02am EDT
