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
2026 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 15–18, 2026
Phoenix, AZ|Arizona Grand Resort & Spa
Latest Magazine Issues
Sep 2026
Jan 2026
2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
October 2026
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Westinghouse, Nordion, and PSEG team up to produce Co‑60 in the United States
This past January, Westinghouse Electric Company, Nordion, and PSEG Nuclear formalized agreements to implement newly developed cobalt-60 production technology at Units 1 and 2 of PSEG’s Salem nuclear power plant in New Jersey, with the Co-60 to be supplied to Nordion. Through an ongoing joint initiative, the companies aim to harness U.S. pressurized water reactors to produce a key medical isotope and build the first commercial-scale Co-60 production platform in the United States.
Linda D. Vickers
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 145 | Number 3 | November 2003 | Pages 354-375
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE03-A2388
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper provides the radiation absorbed dose rates (rad-h-1) to a tissue-equivalent torus ring at 1 meter from radioactive spallation products in Ta, W, Pb, Bi, and LBE target materials used in Accelerator Transmutation of Waste (ATW) applications. No previous works have provided an estimate of the absorbed dose rates (rad-h-1) to tissue from activated targets for ATW applications. In addition, this paper provides the characterization of target materials of high-energy particle accelerators for the parameters of (a) spallation neutron yield (neutrons/proton), (b) spallation products yield (nuclides/proton), (c) energy-dependent spallation neutron fluence distribution (n-cm-2 MeV-1), and (d) identification of the optimal target dimensions to yield the maximum radial spallation neutron leakage from the target. A beneficial characteristic of these target materials (Ta, W, Pb, Bi, and LBE) is they do not produce radioactive transuranic isotopes, which have very long half-lives and require special handling and disposition controls. In addition, these activated, spent targets are not considered high-level radioactive waste for disposal purposes such as spent fuel from a nuclear power reactor.