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Division Spotlight
Human Factors, Instrumentation & Controls
Improving task performance, system reliability, system and personnel safety, efficiency, and effectiveness are the division's main objectives. Its major areas of interest include task design, procedures, training, instrument and control layout and placement, stress control, anthropometrics, psychological input, and motivation.
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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Latest News
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.
José Ramón Ramírez Sánchez, John Garcia, R. T. Perry
Nuclear Technology | Volume 168 | Number 2 | November 2009 | Pages 524-527
Shielding | Special Issue on the 11th International Conference on Radiation Shielding and the 15th Topical Meeting of the Radiation Protection and Shielding Division (Part 2) / Radiation Protection | doi.org/10.13182/NT09-A9237
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
For environmental reasons, it was proposed to remove the lead shielding in the front panel of a glove box and replace it with another material. This technical note shows that steel could be used. Also, the thickness of steel required to maintain acceptable doses to an operator is determined. Computer modeling and analysis show that 3.175 cm (1¼ in.) of steel is required to maintain the same dose to the operator from gamma radiation as 0.635 cm (¼ in.) of lead. However, it was demonstrated that source placement and geometry play a large role in the operator's dose independent of the structural material because of streaming through ports and windows. Because of streaming, the dose received through the metal in the front panel was not the dominant source of radiation to the operator. It was found that 1.5875 cm (5/8 in.) of steel could be used in the panel.