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.
Division Spotlight
Aerospace Nuclear Science & Technology
Organized to promote the advancement of knowledge in the use of nuclear science and technologies in the aerospace application. Specialized nuclear-based technologies and applications are needed to advance the state-of-the-art in aerospace design, engineering and operations to explore planetary bodies in our solar system and beyond, plus enhance the safety of air travel, especially high speed air travel. Areas of interest will include but are not limited to the creation of nuclear-based power and propulsion systems, multifunctional materials to protect humans and electronic components from atmospheric, space, and nuclear power system radiation, human factor strategies for the safety and reliable operation of nuclear power and propulsion plants by non-specialized personnel and more.
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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May 2025
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.
C. R. Brinkman, G. E. Korth, R. R. Hobbins
Nuclear Technology | Volume 16 | Number 1 | October 1972 | Pages 297-307
Technical Paper | Reactor Materials Performance / Material | doi.org/10.13182/NT72-A31195
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Comparing data obtained from tests conducted on unirradiated Type 316 stainless steel in either the solution annealed or solution annealed and aged condition showed that aging was beneficial in improving both the fatigue and creep-fatigue properties at 593°C (1100°F). An indication was found that unirradiated Type 304 stainless steel would be more suitable for applications involving creep-fatigue interaction than unirradiated Type 316 stainless steel. Irradiation to fluences of 0.17 to 6.1 × 1021 n/cm2 E > 0.1 MeV (450°C), resulted in a pronounced effect on the creep-fatigue resistance of these materials when tested at a strain range of 1%. Both fatigue and creep damage values were calculated using actual times and cycles to failure and design times and cycles to failure. These damage values were summed linearly. Damage sums obtained were not found to be a unique value but dependent upon strain range, length of tensile hold time, and material condition. Comparisons between estimates of irradiated fatigue behavior and actual irradiated fatigue lifetimes were made using limited data available. Estimates made using irradiated tensile data were usually found to be conservative in predicting pure fatigue behavior.
