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Aerospace Nuclear Science & Technology
Organized to promote the advancement of knowledge in the use of nuclear science and technologies in the aerospace application. Specialized nuclear-based technologies and applications are needed to advance the state-of-the-art in aerospace design, engineering and operations to explore planetary bodies in our solar system and beyond, plus enhance the safety of air travel, especially high speed air travel. Areas of interest will include but are not limited to the creation of nuclear-based power and propulsion systems, multifunctional materials to protect humans and electronic components from atmospheric, space, and nuclear power system radiation, human factor strategies for the safety and reliable operation of nuclear power and propulsion plants by non-specialized personnel and more.
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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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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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Proving DRACO will deliver
The United States is now closer than it has been in over five decades to launching the first nuclear thermal rocket into space, thanks to DRACO—the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Orbit.
Jean Ragusa, Richard Sanchez, Simone Santandrea
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 157 | Number 3 | November 2007 | Pages 299-315
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE07-A2729
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper treats the problem of determining equivalent homogenized cross sections that preserve a set of prescribed reference albedos obtained from a heterogeneous reflector. This equivalence problem is treated as an optimization problem where the minimum of a functional is sought. Duality is used for a direct estimation of the derivatives needed in the iterative calculation of the optimal homogenized cross sections. We analyze both diffusion and transport as low-order operators for the equivalence and propose several choices for constraining the unknown cross sections. Numerical results illustrate the new approach for one-dimensional PN core calculations.