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 Winter Conference & Expo
November 15–18, 2026
Phoenix, AZ|Arizona Grand Resort & Spa
Latest Magazine Issues
Aug 2026
Jan 2026
2026
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
October 2026
Nuclear Technology
September 2026
Fusion Science and Technology
August 2026
Latest News
LLNL, Ampera partner to develop thorium-based TRISO fuel
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has formed a strategic partnership with Ampera to develop the company’s nuclear fuel concept through a project named THUNDER, for Thorium Unimodal Droplet Ejection for Reactors.
The focus of THUNDER is fabricating TRISO made with kernels of thorium rather than the usual uranium. LLNL and Ampera will evaluate and optimize liquid metal–jetting technology to produce highly uniform, spherical kernels of thorium-232 for later processing into TRISO fuel.
C. Ganguly, G. J. Prasad, K. N. Mahule, J. K. Ghosh, K. V. J. Asari, K. N. P. Chandrasekharan, S. Muralidhar, T. S. Balan, P. R. Roy
Nuclear Technology | Volume 96 | Number 1 | October 1991 | Pages 72-83
Technical Paper | Nuclear Fuel Cycle | doi.org/10.13182/NT91-A35534
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Aluminum-clad Al-20 wt% 233 U and Al-23 wt% Pu plate fuel subassemblies have been fabricated for the Purnima III critical facility and the Kamini research reactor. The fabrication flow sheet consists of preparing the master alloy using aluminum and uranium or plutonium metals as feed materials, remelting and casting the fuel alloy ingots, rolling, picture framing and sandwiching the fuel alloy between aluminum sheets, roll bonding, locating the fuel alloy core outline by X-ray radiography, and trimming and machining to final dimensions. Metallic molds produce better ingots than graphite ones. The addition of zirconium during melting improves the microstructure of the Al-U and Al-Pu castings and facilitates hot rolling of the ingots. In the subassembly the fuel plates are finally locked in aluminum spacer grooves by a novel roll-swaging technique. High-resolution X-ray radiographs and microdensitometric scans are utilized to confirm the homogeneous distribution of the fissile material in the fuel plates. Nonbond areas are detected by blister testing and immersion ultrasonic testing of the roll-bonded fuel plates.