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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
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!
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Commercial nuclear innovation "new space" age
In early 2006, a start-up company launched a small rocket from a tiny island in the Pacific. It exploded, showering the island with debris. A year later, a second launch attempt sent a rocket to space but failed to make orbit, burning up in the atmosphere. Another year brought a third attempt—and a third failure. The following month, in September 2008, the company used the last of its funds to launch a fourth rocket. It reached orbit, making history as the first privately funded liquid-fueled rocket to do so.
Sergey S. Gorodkov
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 172 | Number 2 | October 2012 | Pages 193-201
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE11-105
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Significant underprediction bias in uncertainties of neutron flux is observed in Monte Carlo criticality calculations of large cores. It is universally recognized that this underprediction is closely associated with the ratio of the second-largest eigenvalue to the largest eigenvalue, or the dominance ratio, of the fission kernel. In this paper a close analogy is presumed between neutron flux autocorrelations in Monte Carlo calculations and flux variances due to stochastic uncertainties of the properties of fuel assemblies within the manufacturing tolerance limits. Interesting consequences following from this analogy are confirmed in quite realistic calculations. A useful expression is derived for fast evaluation of the minimal number of histories to be modeled to achieve preset confidence limits of flux distribution in large cores.