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Aerospace Nuclear Science & Technology
Organized to promote the advancement of knowledge in the use of nuclear science and technologies in the aerospace application. Specialized nuclear-based technologies and applications are needed to advance the state-of-the-art in aerospace design, engineering and operations to explore planetary bodies in our solar system and beyond, plus enhance the safety of air travel, especially high speed air travel. Areas of interest will include but are not limited to the creation of nuclear-based power and propulsion systems, multifunctional materials to protect humans and electronic components from atmospheric, space, and nuclear power system radiation, human factor strategies for the safety and reliable operation of nuclear power and propulsion plants by non-specialized personnel and more.
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International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Methods Applied to Nuclear Science and Engineering (M&C 2025)
April 27–30, 2025
Denver, CO|The Westin Denver 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
Dragonfly, a Pu-fueled drone heading to Titan, gets key NASA approval
Curiosity landed on Mars sporting a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG) in 2012, and a second NASA rover, Perseverance, landed in 2021. Both are still rolling across the red planet in the name of science. Another exploratory craft with a similar plutonium-238–fueled RTG but a very different mission—to fly between multiple test sites on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon—recently got one step closer to deployment.
On April 25, NASA and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) announced that the Dragonfly mission to Saturn’s icy moon passed its critical design review. “Passing this mission milestone means that Dragonfly’s mission design, fabrication, integration, and test plans are all approved, and the mission can now turn its attention to the construction of the spacecraft itself,” according to NASA.
Michael J. Gouge, Lee M. Hively, Dilip K. Bhadra
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 6 | Number 3 | November 1984 | Pages 537-542
Technical Paper | Plasma Engineering | doi.org/10.13182/FST84-A23134
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The effects of producing a net toroidal current in the Fusion Engineering Device (FED-A) by using an input magnetosonic (or fast) wave to modify the alpha-particle velocity distribution function through momentum transfer via the transit time damping process are studied. The alpha-particle distribution becomes anisotropic, producing a net current through collisions with the background electrons. The fast wave is found to be accessible, and resonances at cyclotron harmonics and the ion-ion hybrid layer can be minimized by choosing ω ∼ 4ωCD, where ωCD is the deuterium cyclotron frequency. The calculation is based on an alpha-particle velocity distribution function accounting for slowing down against the background plasma electrons. The efficiency of the process is found to compare favorably with lower hybrid current drive, but the magnitude of the induced current falls short of the FED-A design current with the assumed value of the wave parallel magnetic field.
