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.
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
2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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
Apr 2024
Jan 2024
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
May 2024
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
Scott D. Ramsey, Roy A. Axford
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 166 | Number 1 | September 2010 | Pages 48-57
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE09-64
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
We implement direct and approximate local sensitivity analysis techniques within the context of stochastic point kinetics neglecting delayed neutrons and external neutron sources. After reviewing the derivation of certain probabilities that the neutron population in a nuclear assembly is exactly zero [probabilities of extinction (POEs)], we consider their dependence on physical data. We subsequently focus on fission number distribution dependence and draw comparisons between two different data sets. As various POEs are dependent upon these data through the solution of a nonlinear ordinary differential equation, local sensitivity analysis provides a useful means through which to assess the effects of data reevaluation. We first conduct this analysis generally (though approximately) using Gâteaux-derivative methodology. Following the generalized developments, exact and approximate results for 235U are presented with a discussion concerning important consequences related to criticality safety.