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.
Division Spotlight
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
Meeting Spotlight
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
Standards Program
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
June 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
May 2025
Latest News
Argonne’s METL gears up to test more sodium fast reactor components
Argonne National Laboratory has successfully swapped out an aging cold trap in the sodium test loop called METL (Mechanisms Engineering Test Loop), the Department of Energy announced April 23. The upgrade is the first of its kind in the United States in more than 30 years, according to the DOE, and will help test components and operations for the sodium-cooled fast reactors being developed now.
A. Kumar, M.Z. Youssef, Y. Ikeda, C. Konno, Y. Oyama
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 19 | Number 3 | May 1991 | Pages 1859-1866
Neutronic | Proceedings of the Ninth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (Oak Brook, Illinois, October 7-11, 1990) | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A29614
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The recently concluded phase IIIA experiments of the USDOE/JAERI collaborative program mark a watershed in that a D-T line source was simulated by moving detectors/annular Li2O blanket-assembly with respect to a stationary point source. Three experiments were conducted in three stages during this phase: (i) source characterization (step-mode, 10 cm step, 9h47m duration, 3 sample locations), (ii) in-situ short irradiation (stationary assembly, 30m duration, 2 sample locations), (iii) in-situ long irradiation (continuous-mode, 9h51m duration, 3 sample locations). The sample-materials included: Fe, Ni, Mo, SS316, W, Ta, Zr, Al, Sn, Ag, Pb, Zn, Nb, Ti, V, Co and In. The sample locations inside the phase IIIA assembly were so chosen as to monitor (a) the impact of lack of line source simulation on decay γ-radioactivity, (b) the influence of SS304 first wall, (c) the role of neutron spectral degradation in the annular Li2O fusion blanket assembly. The experimental results demonstrate that: (1) continuous-mode operation provides better simulation of line source even for radioactive products of half lives as low as ∼10 min, (2) the decay γ-emission rates generally drop as one moves away from the center of simulated line source (length=2 meters), (3) the presence of surrounding annular blanket leads to larger enhancements in the γ-emission rates ascribable to reactions induced by energy-degraded neutrons. The analysis of these measurements shows up discrepancies for most of the materials. DKRICF lacks decay data for many isotopes. For example, decay data is absent for Y, 186Ta, 187W, and 181W. For Zr, 91mY contribution is severely underestimated. Severe underestimation hits Zn and Sn (especially 117mSn and 111In). REAC2 related more important observations can be summarized as follows: For Mo, 91Mo is strongly overestimated and 101Mo, 99Mo, 98mNb, 97Nb, 93mNb are underestimated. For Zr, 89m+gZr, 90mY and 91mY are strongly overestimated. For W, 179mW yields abnormally large contribution for both short and long cooling times. The data base for Zn needs complete overhaul as for some isotopes there is strong overestimation (65Ni, 67Cu and 69Zn), while yet for others, there is severe underestimation (69mZn, 65Zn and 64Cu).
