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Human Factors, Instrumentation & Controls
Improving task performance, system reliability, system and personnel safety, efficiency, and effectiveness are the division's main objectives. Its major areas of interest include task design, procedures, training, instrument and control layout and placement, stress control, anthropometrics, psychological input, and motivation.
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2025 ANS Annual Conference
June 15–18, 2025
Chicago, IL|Chicago Marriott Downtown
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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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Latest News
High-temperature plumbing and advanced reactors
The use of nuclear fission power and its role in impacting climate change is hotly debated. Fission advocates argue that short-term solutions would involve the rapid deployment of Gen III+ nuclear reactors, like Vogtle-3 and -4, while long-term climate change impact would rely on the creation and implementation of Gen IV reactors, “inherently safe” reactors that use passive laws of physics and chemistry rather than active controls such as valves and pumps to operate safely. While Gen IV reactors vary in many ways, one thing unites nearly all of them: the use of exotic, high-temperature coolants. These fluids, like molten salts and liquid metals, can enable reactor engineers to design much safer nuclear reactors—ultimately because the boiling point of each fluid is extremely high. Fluids that remain liquid over large temperature ranges can provide good heat transfer through many demanding conditions, all with minimal pressurization. Although the most apparent use for these fluids is advanced fission power, they have the potential to be applied to other power generation sources such as fusion, thermal storage, solar, or high-temperature process heat.1–3
Jin Feng Huang
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 196 | Number 7 | July 2022 | Pages 873-885
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2021.2025299
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The solitary wave naturally arises in many areas of mathematical physics, including in nonlinear optics, plasma physics, quantum field theory, and fluid mechanics. In the past few years, for an advanced nuclear energy system, a particular class of traveling wave reactor called the Constant Axial shape of Neutron flux, nuclide number densities and power shape During Life of Energy production (CANDLE) reactor has been proposed, and an analytical solution has been desired since it could reveal the global characters of the solution. In this study, from the perspective of the solitary wave, the analytical solution of this advanced nuclear energy system is demonstrated through coupling the one-group neutron diffusion equation with the burnup equation. The tanh-function method is applied to solve that nonlinear partial differential equation. The relationship between the velocity of the solitary wave, wave amplitude, or neutron flux and the evolution of the nuclide is revealed by the analytical method. The results demonstrate that the neutron flux is proportional to the wave velocity. The results also imply that the amplitude of the neutron flux is proportional to the square root of the diffusion coefficient but is inversely proportional to the initial 238U density.
