ANS is committed to advancing, fostering, and promoting the development and application of nuclear sciences and technologies to benefit society.
Explore the many uses for nuclear science and its impact on energy, the environment, healthcare, food, and more.
Explore membership for yourself or for your organization.
Conference Spotlight
2026 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
Latest Magazine Issues
Feb 2026
Jul 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
March 2026
Nuclear Technology
February 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
January 2026
Latest News
Fusion energy: Progress, partnerships, and the path to deployment
Over the past decade, fusion energy has moved decisively from scientific aspiration toward a credible pathway to a new energy technology. Thanks to long-term federal support, we have significantly advanced our fundamental understanding of plasma physics—the behavior of the superheated gases at the heart of fusion devices. This knowledge will enable the creation and control of fusion fuel under conditions required for future power plants. Our progress is exemplified by breakthroughs at the National Ignition Facility and the Joint European Torus.
K. A. Werley, C. G. Bathke, R. A. Krakowski, R. L. Miller, J. N. DiMarco
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 19 | Number 3 | May 1991 | Pages 1266-1271
Result of Large Experiment and Plasma Engineering | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A29515
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Essential to the achievement of economically compact fusion power cores is the radiation of a large fraction of the plasma heating power uniformly to the first wall, thereby assuring adequate longevity of the divertor impurity control system. The radiation of significant fractions of the heating power from the beta-limited core-plasma region in an RFP, however, requires a corresponding increase in the quality of (non-radiative) confinement. It is shown that radiating ≳ 70% of the total heating power from the core plasma of the TITAN compact reversed-field-pinch (RFP) reactor is possible with non-radiative confinement times that are a large factor (> 15) below classical confinement predictions and are within the present scaling relation based upon extrapolations of the existing RFP transport database. By comparison, the confinement in the ARIES-I tokamak reactor is within a factor of 2 of neo-classical predictions.