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 Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
August 24–27, 2026
Dallas, TX|Hilton Anatole
Latest Magazine Issues
Jun 2026
Jan 2026
2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
July 2026
Nuclear Technology
June 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
May 2026
Latest News
Antares achieves zero-power criticality at INL
Leveraging more than $140 million in private capital fundraising, over 322,000 square feet of operational manufacturing space, and multifaceted partnerships with the Departments of Energy and Defense, reactor start-up Antares has become the first company involved in the Reactor Pilot Program to achieve zero-power fueled criticality—a full month ahead of the July 4 deadline set by President Trump’s Executive Order 14301.
This milestone, announced yesterday, was achieved with the company’s Mark-0: a sodium heat-pipe-cooled, TRISO-fueled microreactor. The Mark-0 is a forerunner to the company’s flagship design, which it calls the R1. For Antares, this development represents a key validation of its reactor physics, control systems, and supply chain.
M. Wisse, L. Marot, R. Steiner, D. Mathys, A. Stumpp, M. Joanny, J. M. Travère, E. Meyer
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 66 | Number 2 | October 2014 | Pages 308-314
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST13-771
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In order to extend the investigation of laser-assisted cleaning of ITER-relevant first mirror materials to the picosecond regime, a commercial laser system delivering 10-ps pulses at 355 nm at a frequency of up to 1 MHz has been used to investigate the ablation of mixed aluminum (oxide)/tungsten (oxide) layers deposited on polycrystalline and nanocrystalline molybdenum as well as nanocrystalline rhodium mirrors. Characterization before and after cleaning using scanning electron microscopy and spectrophotometry shows heavy dust formation, resulting in a degradation of the reflectivity. Cleaning using 5-ns pulses at 350 and 532 nm, on the other hand, proved very promising. The structure of the film remnants suggests that in this case buckling was the underlying removal mechanism rather than ablation. Repeated coating and cleaning using nanosecond pulses is demonstrated.