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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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2025 ANS Annual Conference
June 15–18, 2025
Chicago, IL|Chicago Marriott Downtown
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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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Latest News
High-temperature plumbing and advanced reactors
The use of nuclear fission power and its role in impacting climate change is hotly debated. Fission advocates argue that short-term solutions would involve the rapid deployment of Gen III+ nuclear reactors, like Vogtle-3 and -4, while long-term climate change impact would rely on the creation and implementation of Gen IV reactors, “inherently safe” reactors that use passive laws of physics and chemistry rather than active controls such as valves and pumps to operate safely. While Gen IV reactors vary in many ways, one thing unites nearly all of them: the use of exotic, high-temperature coolants. These fluids, like molten salts and liquid metals, can enable reactor engineers to design much safer nuclear reactors—ultimately because the boiling point of each fluid is extremely high. Fluids that remain liquid over large temperature ranges can provide good heat transfer through many demanding conditions, all with minimal pressurization. Although the most apparent use for these fluids is advanced fission power, they have the potential to be applied to other power generation sources such as fusion, thermal storage, solar, or high-temperature process heat.1–3
T. N. Todd
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 64 | Number 2 | August 2013 | Pages 76-85
Keynote and Plenary - I | Proceedings of the Twentieth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (TOFE-2012) (Part 1), Nashville, Tennessee, August 27-31, 2012 | doi.org/10.13182/FST12-557
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Now that ITER is under construction, interest is increasing in the specification and design of the successor machine, a Demonstration Power Plant (DEMO), which in Europe is coordinated by the EFDA Power Plant Physics and Technology programme. This paper summarises the work carried out for EFDA in 2011-2012 on design issues pertinent to a pulsed version of DEMO, intended to be implemented with little or no extrapolation of technology available today. The work was carried out by the Euratom Fusion Associations CCFE, CEA, CRPP, ENEA and KIT, and in addition to a review of recent relevant literature addressed systems code analyses (pulse length vs. size), erosion of plasma facing components, thermomechanical fatigue in the blanket and first wall, a range of energy storage issues, and fatigue life improvements in Nb3Sn CICC superconductors.