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Division Spotlight
Reactor Physics
The division's objectives are to promote the advancement of knowledge and understanding of the fundamental physical phenomena characterizing nuclear reactors and other nuclear systems. The division encourages research and disseminates information through meetings and publications. Areas of technical interest include nuclear data, particle interactions and transport, reactor and nuclear systems analysis, methods, design, validation and operating experience and standards. The Wigner Award heads the awards program.
Meeting Spotlight
International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Methods Applied to Nuclear Science and Engineering (M&C 2025)
April 27–30, 2025
Denver, CO|The Westin Denver Downtown
Standards Program
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
Dragonfly, a Pu-fueled drone heading to Titan, gets key NASA approval
Curiosity landed on Mars sporting a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG) in 2012, and a second NASA rover, Perseverance, landed in 2021. Both are still rolling across the red planet in the name of science. Another exploratory craft with a similar plutonium-238–fueled RTG but a very different mission—to fly between multiple test sites on Titan, Saturn’s largest moon—recently got one step closer to deployment.
On April 25, NASA and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) announced that the Dragonfly mission to Saturn’s icy moon passed its critical design review. “Passing this mission milestone means that Dragonfly’s mission design, fabrication, integration, and test plans are all approved, and the mission can now turn its attention to the construction of the spacecraft itself,” according to NASA.
L. R. van Loon, W. Hummel
Nuclear Technology | Volume 128 | Number 3 | December 1999 | Pages 359-371
Technical Paper | Radioactive Waste Management and Disposal | doi.org/10.13182/NT99-A3037
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The formation of water-soluble organic ligands by radiolytic and chemical degradation of several strong acidic ion-exchange resins was investigated under conditions close to those of the near field of a cementitious repository. The most important degradation products were studied and their complexing properties evaluated.Irradiation of strong acidic cation exchange resins (Powdex PCH and Lewatite S-100) resulted in the formation of mainly sulfate and dissolved organic carbon. High-performance liquid chromatography analysis indicated the presence of oxalate, contributing to 10 to 20% of the organic carbon. The identity of the remainder is unknown. The presence of oxalate as a complexant is consistent with results from earlier work. Complexation studies with Cu2+ and Ni2+ showed the presence of two ligands: oxalate and ligand X. Although ligand X could not be identified, it could be characterized by its concentration ([X]T ~ 10-5 to 10-6 M), a deprotonation constant (pKH ~ 7.4 at I = 0.1 M), and a complexation constant for the NiX complex (log KNiX ~ 7.0 at I = 0.1 M).In the absence of irradiation, no evidence for the formation of ligands was found.
