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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
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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
Zap Energy hits 37-million-degree electron temperatures in compact fusion device
Zap Energy announced April 23 that it has reached 1-3 keV plasma electron temperatures—roughly the equivalent of 11 to 37 million degrees Celsius—using its sheared-flow-stabilized Z-pinch approach to fusion. Reaching temperatures above that of the sun’s core (which is 10 million degrees Celsius temperature) is just one hurdle required before any fusion confinement concept can realistically pursue net gain and fusion energy.
Kimberly A. DeFriend, Brent Espinoza, Brian Patterson
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 51 | Number 4 | May 2007 | Pages 693-700
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST07-A1466
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The sol-gel methods applied in the synthesis of aerogels lead to the formation of a disordered silica network. The resulting aerogel has poor structural definition that leads to poor mechanical properties. The work presented details our efforts to create a new hierarchical mesoporous silica aerogel. These meso-porous aerogels were formed utilizing a templating technique using polystyrene beads with varying diameters, 50 nm to 2 m, dispersed during sol-gel polymerization. The resulting gel was super-critically dried creating a silica aerogel templated with polystyrene beads. The polystyrene beads were then thermal oxidized creating meso-porous silica aerogel monolith. The surface area, pore volume, pore diameter, and mechanical properties of the templated aerogels were determined. Interestingly the mechanical properties of the meso-porous aerogel were significantly improved. These improvements appear to be directly related to the polystyrene bead diameter and loading.