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 Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2026
Jan 2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
May 2026
Nuclear Technology
March 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
NRC introduces microreactor regulatory framework
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has released a new licensing framework for microreactors and similar reactor designs that may provide a more suitable pathway for applicants with simpler technologies.
The proposed rule—known as Part 57—is the latest to come out of the NRC’s rules review and overhaul stemming from the ADVANCE Act and 2025 nuclear-related executive orders. It is also the latest framework developed for advanced reactor designs shifting away from light water reactor technology, such as the Part 53 rule finalized in March.
Valeria Raffuzzi, Eugene Shwageraus, Lee Morgan, Paul Cosgrove
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 197 | Number 3 | March 2023 | Pages 364-380
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2022.2107262
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A novel source convergence acceleration method for Monte Carlo eigenvalue calculations is proposed in this paper. The method consists of simulating the bulk of the inactive cycles with online-generated multigroup cross sections. Then the active cycles are simulated with continuous-energy cross sections to preserve full fidelity. The method was implemented in the Monte Carlo code SCONE and tested on several three-dimensional full-length assembly models. In some cases, the same multigroup cross sections were used for several spatially separated materials in order to limit statistical uncertainties. The method was shown to accelerate calculations by a factor of 2.5 to 5 at the cost of a slightly increased standard deviation in the flux distribution estimated across several independent simulations. The memory usage due to storing multigroup cross sections does not seem to be prohibitive for practical applications.