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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 8–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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Nuclear News 40 Under 40: The wait is over
Following the enthusiastic response from the nuclear community in 2024 for the inaugural NN 40 Under 40, the Nuclear News team knew we had to take up the difficult task in 2025 of turning it into an annual event—though there was plenty of uncertainty as to how the community would receive a second iteration this year. That uncertainty was unfounded, clearly, as the tight-knit nuclear community embraced the chance to celebrate its up-and-coming generation of scientists, engineers, and policy makers who are working to grow the influence of this oft-misunderstood technology.
A. Jankowiak, F. Jorion, C. Maillard, L. Donnet
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 160 | Number 3 | November 2008 | Pages 378-384
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE160-378
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This study describes the preparation and characterization of Pu0.5Am0.5O2-x-MgO ceramic/ceramic (cercer) composites with 20 and 30 vol% of Pu0.5Am0.5O2-x. The sintered materials demonstrated very different reduction behavior when exposed to a reducing sintering cycle. The composites were studied by combined X-ray diffraction (XRD) and oxygen-to-metal ratio measurements and exhibited various amounts of body-centered-cubic (bcc) and face-centered-cubic (fcc) phases corresponding to different reduction states of the mixed actinide oxide. The fcc phases correspond to a near stoichiometry phase while the bcc phases are attributed to most reduced phases, which demonstrate a greater similarity with the Am2O3 bcc phase. The XRD results suggest a reduction of Am prior to Pu, which explains this greater similarity. In addition, the 30 vol% composite contains 65 wt% of the bcc phase while the 20 vol% composite exhibits only 29 wt%. This result can be explained by the percolation theory when applied to the oxygen diffusivity and indicates that a threshold value for Pu0.5Am0.5O2-x content in the cercer composite exists where the reduction of the mixed oxide significantly increases.
