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Division Spotlight
Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
Meeting Spotlight
Materials in Nuclear Energy Systems (MiNES 2023)
December 10–14, 2023
New Orleans, LA|New Orleans Marriott
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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Nuclear Science and Engineering
December 2023
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
November 2023
Latest News
Argonne assists advanced reactor development with award-winning safety software
The development of modern nuclear reactor technologies relies heavily on complex software codes and computer simulations to support the design, construction, and testing of physical hardware systems. These tools allow for rigorous testing of theory and thorough verification of design under various use or transient power scenarios.
D. Capelli, D. W. Schmidt, T. Cardenas, G. Rivera, R. B. Randolph, F. Fierro, E. C. Merritt, K. A. Flippo, F. W. Doss, J. L. Kline
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 70 | Number 2 | August-September 2016 | Pages 316-323
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST15-229
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The shear experiments are designed to investigate the transition to turbulence of the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability driven by counter-propagating shear flows. The shear targets for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) shear experiments consist of two hohlraums connected to both ends of a shock tube. The cylindrical shock tube is filled with two hemi-cylindrical CH foams separated by a metal tracer foil. On both ends, a thick gold half-moon–shaped D-plug is placed on opposite halves of the tube to create counter-propagating shock waves. The design is based on a smaller Omega shear target. While the basic NIF design has remained the same, details of the design have undergone several changes over the last 2 years and continue to evolve to improve the quality of the experimental results. Design changes include shock tube designs, tracer foil variations, transitioning to beryllium spool machining, and groove features inside of the tube. Details of how the targets are built including design, machining the parts, target assembly, and metrology are presented, as well as recent target developmental work to meet the needs of future experiments and to improve target assembly efficiency and accuracy.