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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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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.
H. Noguchi, Clay E. Easterly, M. R. Bennett
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 16 | Number 2 | September 1989 | Pages 137-142
Technical Paper | Tritium System | doi.org/10.13182/FST89-A29142
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The conversion reaction of tritium gas (T2) to tritiated water was studied experimentally at initial tritium concentrations between 9.6 × 10−3 and 48 GBq · m−3 (2.6 × 10−4 and 1.3 Ci · m−3) in air. Effects of water vapor and catalysts on the conversion reaction were also examined. Stainless steel, copper, paint, and platinum black were used as potential catalytic surfaces. First-order rate constants for the reaction in air are found to be independent of initial tritium concentration, and there is no effect from water vapor on the reaction. The conversion is insensitive to the presence or absence of stainless steel and copper. Paint sorbs T2 and HTO, but the latter is desorbed from the paint by heating. Platinum black produces the expected increase in the rate of reaction.