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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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Empowering the next generation: ANS’s newest book focuses on careers in nuclear energy
A new career guide for the nuclear energy industry is now available: The Nuclear Empowered Workforce by Earnestine Johnson. Drawing on more than 30 years of experience across 16 nuclear facilities, Johnson offers a practical, insightful look into some of the many career paths available in commercial nuclear power. To mark the release, Johnson sat down with Nuclear News for a wide-ranging conversation about her career, her motivation for writing the book, and her advice for the next generation of nuclear professionals.
When Johnson began her career at engineering services company Stone & Webster, she entered a field still reeling from the effects of the Three Mile Island incident in 1979, nearly 15 years earlier. Her hiring cohort was the first group of new engineering graduates the company had brought on since TMI, a reflection of the industry-wide pause in nuclear construction. Her first long-term assignment—at the Millstone site in Waterford, Conn., helping resolve design issues stemming from TMI—marked the beginning of a long and varied career that spanned positions across the country.
James F. Stubbins
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 1 | July 1983 | Pages 102-119
Technical Paper | Icf chamber Engineering | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A22779
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Thermionic power production is shown to be a viable technique for increasing dry-wall inertial confinement fusion (ICF) power output. Thermionic cells produce electricity directly in a topping cycle run off the high temperatures generated at the first vacuum wall by the absorption of fusion product x rays and charged particles. The high temperatures are used to heat the thermionic emitter, which is an integral part of the first wall The principal engineering consideration is the means of providing the emitter with a high steady-state operating temperature, while the reactor itself operates a pulsed mode with ICF events occurring at between 1 and 20/s. It is shown that several design variables, including materials selection, first-wall thickness, and target firing rate can be chosen to satisfy the emitter temperature requirements. Furthermore, heating requirements do not rely on neutron attenuation, so neutrons can be conserved to meet tritium breeding requirements in the blanket. Several other aspects of the thermionic system design and engineering are discussed. These are related to the current state of development of thermionic convertors, and to possible further advances in the technology.