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
Isotopes & Radiation
Members are devoted to applying nuclear science and engineering technologies involving isotopes, radiation applications, and associated equipment in scientific research, development, and industrial processes. Their interests lie primarily in education, industrial uses, biology, medicine, and health physics. Division committees include Analytical Applications of Isotopes and Radiation, Biology and Medicine, Radiation Applications, Radiation Sources and Detection, and Thermal Power Sources.
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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June 2025
Nuclear Technology
May 2025
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Latest News
Sam Altman steps down as Oklo board chair
Advanced nuclear company Oklo Inc. has new leadership for its board of directors as billionaire Sam Altman is stepping down from the position he has held since 2015. The move is meant to open new partnership opportunities with OpenAI, where Altman is CEO, and other artificial intelligence companies.
Gang Li, Ghaouti Bentoumi, Liqian Li
Nuclear Technology | Volume 208 | Number 7 | July 2022 | Pages 1214-1222
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2021.2011672
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Organic liquid scintillators, such as EJ-309, are capable of detecting fast neutrons and discriminating gamma rays through pulse shape. Higher detection efficiency is a common objective for detector designs and research. This paper describes two methods to enhance fast neutron detection by increasing neutron collection and reducing gamma-ray interference. Neutron collection can be increased by using strong scattering material to reflect neutrons toward scintillators. Gamma-ray interference can be reduced by using heavy material to shield gamma rays; such a material could have a minimal impact on neutron detection because neutrons and gamma rays have different interaction cross sections. In this work, both effects were investigated, experimentally and by simulation. Using a graphite reflector with simple geometry, the fast neutron detection was measured to have an increase of 9%, and simulations predicted an approximately 50% increase for optimized geometry. Using a lead shielding of 8-mm thickness, the neutron detection with a Pu source was measured to have a factor of 2 increase. These methods could be useful when cost-effective and highly efficient fast neutron detection is desired.