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Conference Spotlight
2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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
High temperature fission chambers engineered for AMR/SMR safety and performance
As the global energy landscape shifts towards safer, smaller, and more flexible nuclear power, Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and Gen. IV* technologies are at the forefront of innovation. These advanced designs pose new challenges in size, efficiency, and operating environment that traditional instrumentation and control solutions aren’t always designed to handle.
Wilson Cowherd, John Stillman, Leslie Foyto, Erik Wilson, Kiratadas Kutikkad, Nickie Peters, John Gahl
Nuclear Technology | Volume 207 | Number 10 | October 2021 | Pages 1538-1563
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2020.1829427
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Nonpower reactors licensed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission require a startup test plan as part of any facility modification to verify operability prior to resumption of operations. In order to support conversion of the University of Missouri Research Reactor from the use of highly enriched uranium to low-enriched uranium (LEU) fuel, a startup test plan has been devised to measure certain reactor physics parameters for the initial all-fresh LEU core licensing documentation that will be submitted. These parameters include the approach to critical, primary coolant void coefficient of reactivity, flux trap void coefficient of reactivity, determination of flux trap sample reactivity worth, radial and axial thermal neutron flux mapping, control blade worth calibration, primary and pool coolant temperature coefficient of reactivity, and flux mapping of experimental positions. In this paper, predictions for these parameters made using the Monte Carlo N-Particle Version 5 (MCNP5) radiation transport code are reported. These predictions will support the startup tests by providing a baseline set of expectations and additional insight into the performance of the LEU core.