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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.
Yu. P. Martseniuk, Yu. V. Kovtun, V. E. Moiseenko, A. V. Lozin, A. N. Shapoval, O. V. Yevsiukov, V. B. Korovin, E. D. Kramskoy, M. M. Kozulya, D. I. Baron
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 81 | Number 6 | August 2025 | Pages 530-541
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2025.2478541
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
For the stellarator Uragan-2M, a glow discharge system for wall conditioning was developed and installed. The experiments were conducted in the range of discharge currents from 0.025 to 1 A and argon working gas pressures from 0.27 to 13.1 Pa. It is found that the measured current-voltage characteristics are similar to the discharge with a hollow cathode. In the optical spectrum of the glow discharge plasma, Ar lines of the excited atoms Ar I (Ar*) and ions Ar II (Ar+*) of the main argon gas, as well as the lines of excited hydrogen atoms H I (H*), are observed. The appearance of hydrogen is associated with the desorption of hydrogen from stainless steel because of the interaction of argon with the surface of the vacuum chamber (cathode). The radial profile of plasma density and electron temperature was measured using a movable triple probe. The maximum plasma density was 7.6 × 1014 m−3, and the plasma temperature was 4.6 eV.