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On moving fast and breaking things
Craig Piercycpiercy@ans.org
So much of what is happening in federal nuclear policy these days seems driven by a common approach popularized in the technology sector. Silicon Valley calls it “move fast and break things,” a phrase originally associated with Facebook’s early culture under Mark Zuckerberg. The idea emerged in the early 2000s as software companies discovered that rapid iteration, frequent experimentation, and a willingness to tolerate failure could dramatically accelerate innovation. This philosophy helped drive the growth of the social media, smartphones, cloud computing, and digital platforms that now underpin modern economic and social life.
Today, that mindset is also influencing federal nuclear policy. The Trump administration views accelerated nuclear deployment as part of a broader competition with China for technological and AI leadership. In that context, it seems willing to accept greater operational risk in pursuit of strategic advantage and long-term economic and security objectives.
T. Höhne, D. Lucas
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 194 | Number 10 | October 2020 | Pages 859-872
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2020.1764265
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This technical paper presents an application of the GEneralized TwO Phase flow (GENTOP) model for phase transfer and discusses the submodels used. Boiling of a heated surface under atmospheric conditions is simulated by the multifield computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach. Subcooled water in a generic pool is heated up first in the near-wall region leading to the generation of small bubbles. Farther away from the bottom wall, larger bubbles are generated by coalescence and evaporation. The CFD simulation is based on the recently developed GENTOP concept. It is a multifield model using the Euler-Euler approach, and it allows the consideration of different local-flow morphologies, including transitions between them. Small steam bubbles are handled as dispersed phases, while the interface of large gas structures is statistically resolved. The multiscale simulation of the transitions from small bubble to larger structures during boiling in a pool is now feasible. However, the GENTOP submodels need a constant improvement and a separate, intensive validation effort using CFD-grade experiments.