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Nuclear Criticality Safety
NCSD provides communication among nuclear criticality safety professionals through the development of standards, the evolution of training methods and materials, the presentation of technical data and procedures, and the creation of specialty publications. In these ways, the division furthers the exchange of technical information on nuclear criticality safety with the ultimate goal of promoting the safe handling of fissionable materials outside reactors.
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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!
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Latest News
Webinar: MC&A and safety in advanced reactors in focus
Towell
Russell
Prasad
The American Nuclear Society’s Nuclear Nonproliferation Policy Division recently hosted a webinar on updating material control and accounting (MC&A) and security regulations for the evolving field of advanced reactors.
Moderator Shikha Prasad (CEO, Srijan LLC) was joined by two presenters, John Russell and Lester Towell, who looked at how regulations that were historically developed for traditional light water reactors will apply to the next generation of nuclear technology and what changes need to be made.
Suhas Bhandarkar, Jacob Betcher, Ryan Smith, Bruce Lairson, Travis Ayers
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 70 | Number 2 | August-September 2016 | Pages 332-340
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST15-218
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Targets for inertial confinement fusion shots on the National Ignition Facility typically use thin polyimide films, ~500 nm, with a coating of 25 nm of aluminum as windows that seal the laser entrance hole. Their role is to contain the hohlraum gas and minimize the extraneous infrared radiation getting in. This is necessary to control precisely the hohlraum thermal environment for layering inside the capsule with solid deuterium-tritium at 18 K. Here, we use our empirical data on the bulging behavior of these foils under various different conditions to develop models to capture the complex viscoelastic behavior of these films at both room and cryogenic temperatures. The constitutive equations derived from these models give us the ability to quantitatively specify the film’s behavior during the fielding of these targets and set the best parameters for new target designs.