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Division Spotlight
Mathematics & Computation
Division members promote the advancement of mathematical and computational methods for solving problems arising in all disciplines encompassed by the Society. They place particular emphasis on numerical techniques for efficient computer applications to aid in the dissemination, integration, and proper use of computer codes, including preparation of computational benchmark and development of standards for computing practices, and to encourage the development on new computer codes and broaden their use.
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.
Yasuteru Sibamoto, Hideo Nakamura, Yoshinari Anoda
Nuclear Technology | Volume 133 | Number 1 | January 2001 | Pages 119-132
Technical Paper | Radioisotopes | doi.org/10.13182/NT01-A3163
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Neutron radiography was used to observe the behavior of molten lead-bismuth alloy injected into a thin (10-mm) semicircular vessel, which was empty or contained saturated water. The fluid velocity distribution for the melt injected into the empty vessel was successfully measured using particle image velocimetry (PIV). The numerical analysis for this case using the FLOW-3D code revealed that the wall heat transfer attenuates the rotational speed of swirls that were formed during the melt injection. The melt-coolant interaction experiment demonstrated several features of molten fuel and coolant interactions in the reactor pressure vessel lower head. The violent vapor expansion occurred at the initial melt impact on the saturated pool water. A one-dimensional model predicted the observed behavior well by assuming the adiabatic expansion immediately after an instantaneous heat transfer during the first melt coolant contact. A crust was formed between the melt and coolant by the heterogeneous distribution of the coolant and pool melt. The convective velocity distribution in the pool melt was measured well by the PIV.
