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2026 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
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Latest News
RIC session focuses on interagency collaboration
Attendees at last week’s 2026 Regulatory Information Conference, hosted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, saw extensive discussion of new reactor technologies, uprates, fusion, multiunit deployments, supply chain, and much more.
With the industry in a state of rapid evolution, there was much to discuss. Connected to all these topics was one central theme: the ongoing changes at the NRC. With massively shortened timelines, the ADVANCE Act and Executive Order 14300, and new interagency collaboration and authorization pathways in mind, speakers spent much of the RIC exploring what the road ahead looks like for the NRC.
Steven J. Zinkle
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 47 | Number 4 | May 2005 | Pages 821-828
Technical Paper | Fusion Energy - Fusion Materials | doi.org/10.13182/FST05-A788
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Highlights of recent U.S. fusion materials research activities are summarized, including multiscale materials modeling and experimental results. Recent first principles atomistic calculations on vanadium and iron-helium have found that previous interatomic potentials incorrectly predict several important point defect properties. Molecular dynamics simulations of displacement cascades are now approaching energies equivalent to 14 MeV fusion neutrons. Considerable effort is being devoted to understanding the fundamental mechanisms of low temperature radiation hardening and embrittlement. Work is also in progress to determine the allowable temperature and dose operating regimes for candidate reduced activation structural materials (including transmutant helium effects). New compositions of reduced activation steels and vanadium alloys with potential for significantly improved properties are being investigated. Due to recent improvements in SiC/SiC ceramic composites, engineering-relevant mechanical property tests are being introduced to replace historical qualitative screening tests. Materials research in support of the ITER burning plasma physics machine is briefly described.