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 Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
Latest Magazine Issues
Jan 2026
Jul 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
January 2026
Nuclear Technology
December 2025
Fusion Science and Technology
November 2025
Latest News
2025: The year in nuclear
As Nuclear News has done since 2022, we have compiled a review of the nuclear news that filled headlines and sparked conversations in the year just completed. Departing from the chronological format of years past, we open with the most impactful news of 2025: a survey of actions and orders of the Trump administration that are reshaping nuclear research, development, deployment, and commercialization. We then highlight some of the top news in nuclear restarts, new reactor testing programs, the fuel supply chain and broader fuel cycle, and more.
Munemichi Kawaguchi, Yasushi Hirakawa, Yusuke Sugita, Yutaka Yamaguchi
Nuclear Technology | Volume 210 | Number 1 | January 2024 | Pages 55-71
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2023.2214261
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This study has researched an estimation method for the amounts of residual sodium film and sodium lumps on dummy fuel pins in the Japanese prototype fast breeder reactor Monju by fundamental experiments and demonstration experiments. The residual sodium amounts on the pin surface were measured using three types of test specimens: (a) single pin, (b) 7-pin assembly, and (c) 169-pin assembly. The single pin and 7-pin assembly experiments revealed that the withdrawal speed of the pins and improvement of the sodium wetting drastically increased the residual sodium amounts. Furthermore, the 169-pin assembly experiments measured the practical amounts of the residual sodium in the Monju dummy fuel assembly and demonstrated sodium draining behavior through small gaps between the pins. The estimation method includes four models such as a viscosity flow model, Landau-Levich-Derjaguin (LLD) model, an empirical equation related to the Bretherton model, and a capillary force model in a tube. These calculation results were comparable to the residual sodium amounts obtained by the experiments. In the tests of improving sodium wetting, the amounts of residual sodium on the test specimen were close to 1.4 times larger than those of the thin sodium film estimated by the LLD model. The increased amount of residual sodium by improving the sodium wetting was explained by the ratio of the adhesion energy ().