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
Thermal Hydraulics
The division provides a forum for focused technical dialogue on thermal hydraulic technology in the nuclear industry. Specifically, this will include heat transfer and fluid mechanics involved in the utilization of nuclear energy. It is intended to attract the highest quality of theoretical and experimental work to ANS, including research on basic phenomena and application to nuclear system design.
Meeting Spotlight
2025 ANS Annual Conference
June 15–18, 2025
Chicago, IL|Chicago Marriott 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
Jun 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
July 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Smarter waste strategies: Helping deliver on the promise of advanced nuclear
At COP28, held in Dubai in 2023, a clear consensus emerged: Nuclear energy must be a cornerstone of the global clean energy transition. With electricity demand projected to soar as we decarbonize not just power but also industry, transport, and heat, the case for new nuclear is compelling. More than 20 countries committed to tripling global nuclear capacity by 2050. In the United States alone, the Department of Energy forecasts that the country’s current nuclear capacity could more than triple, adding 200 GW of new nuclear to the existing 95 GW by mid-century.
Francesco Premuda
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 33 | Number 3 | May 1998 | Pages 350-366
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST98-A37
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A theoretical model is proposed in order to explain, via ordinary physics, fundamental aspects of the cold fusion phenomena experimentally observed. These phenomena include unexpected high fusion reaction rates at low temperatures, the paradox of low neutron emission compared to the energy release observed, the cold fusion dependence on critical temperature, neutronic stimulation, and the constitution of nuclei with high electric charge. This theory is based on the hypothesis that a degenerate, cold D12+e- plasma may be created inside lattice defects through a sudden deuteron discharge from a saturated metal lattice. The proposed method is based on the perturbative solution of Vlasov-Poisson kinetic-electric equations. A Fourier transformation of such equations proves that the plasma behaves like an ideal Bose gas of electronically screened deuterons. This approach shows that a high particle density can exist with no pressure increase above the limiting value reached at Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) and that the electrical repulsion field between positive ions disappears below the critical temperature for BEC. Inside the voids created by defects, the behavior of the cold degenerate plasma below critical temperature suppresses the Coulomb barrier between any pair of ions, in particular those that will fuse. The absence of Coulomb barrier allows one to simply predict fusion reaction rates of the order of those found experimentally and the particle trapping in high-density condensate causing fusion chains. The main reactions involved are D12-T13 and D12-He23. Subsequent fusions of the main reaction products lead to nuclei of greater complexity. A high neutron multiplication factor via deuteron disintegrations is calculated. Neutron bursts, temperature, and pressure excursions are also predicted. Finally, new procedures for inducing such reactions outside metal lattices are suggested.