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
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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
Oct 2025
Jul 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
November 2025
Nuclear Technology
October 2025
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Russia withdraws from 25-year-old weapons-grade plutonium agreement
Russia’s lower house of Parliament, the State Duma, approved a measure to withdraw from a 25-year-old agreement with the United States to cut back on the leftover plutonium from Cold War–era nuclear weapons.
G. H. Miley
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 20 | Number 4 | December 1991 | Pages 977-986
Advanced Energy Conversion/Storage and Exotic Concepts | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A11946970
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The importance of direct energy conversion to the long-term development of nuclear power (both fission and fusion) is discussed as an approach to alleviating waste heat problems, reducing overall system costs and enabling new uses such as nuclear space power propulsion. Various approaches that involve direct conversion of radiation energy are considered relative to fission reactors. The examples discussed involve the direct conversion of fission fragment energy to electricity, to thrust for propulsion, and to coherent laser light, illustrating the rich variety of potential conversion methods that can be envisioned.
Applications to future fusion systems are also discussed. Two approaches are considered: direct collection of fusion product energy, and extraction of plasma radiation energy.
Finally, thermal direct conversion is included as an important near term route to enhanced performance, e.g., in-core thermionic converters potentially offer enhanced operation of a SP100 type reactor for space applications.