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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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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.
Peter Taylor, Robert J. Lemire, Donald D. Wood
Nuclear Technology | Volume 104 | Number 2 | November 1993 | Pages 164-170
Technical Paper | Special Issue on Waste Management / Radioactive Waste Management | doi.org/10.13182/NT93-A34880
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Phase relationships among solids in the UO2-O2-H2O system at 25, 100, and 200°C and pressures to 2 MPa have been calculated from critically evaluated thermodynamic data. Stability limits of the solids are expressed in terms of oxygen and water partial pressures at each temperature. The results are then discussed in terms of known UO2 oxidation reactions and uranium mineralogy. Particular attention is paid to “UO3 hydrates, ’’some of which are shown to be stable phases in air at very low relative humidities (down to ∼0.1% at 25°C). This is relevant to fuel storage because of the very high molar volumes of these phases, relative to UO2, and consequent potential for damage to defected fuel assemblies. Comparison of the calculated phase relationships with observed UO2 oxidation behavior helps to identify those phase interconversions that are kinetically constrained.
