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Aerospace Nuclear Science & Technology
Organized to promote the advancement of knowledge in the use of nuclear science and technologies in the aerospace application. Specialized nuclear-based technologies and applications are needed to advance the state-of-the-art in aerospace design, engineering and operations to explore planetary bodies in our solar system and beyond, plus enhance the safety of air travel, especially high speed air travel. Areas of interest will include but are not limited to the creation of nuclear-based power and propulsion systems, multifunctional materials to protect humans and electronic components from atmospheric, space, and nuclear power system radiation, human factor strategies for the safety and reliable operation of nuclear power and propulsion plants by non-specialized personnel and more.
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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
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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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Argonne’s METL gears up to test more sodium fast reactor components
Argonne National Laboratory has successfully swapped out an aging cold trap in the sodium test loop called METL (Mechanisms Engineering Test Loop), the Department of Energy announced April 23. The upgrade is the first of its kind in the United States in more than 30 years, according to the DOE, and will help test components and operations for the sodium-cooled fast reactors being developed now.
Salman Alzahrani (Missouri S&T/KACST), Shoaib Usman (Missouri S&T)
Proceedings | Advances in Thermal Hydraulics 2018 | Orlando, FL, November 11-15, 2018 | Pages 1189-1201
Twisted-tape is one of the most important members of passive heat transfer augmentation techniques for forced convection in many applications. In this paper, a numerical investigation of the heat transfer, pressure drop and secondary flow under the normal operating conditions of the NuScale SMR reactor for sub-channel with and without twisted tape geometry are performed. 3D models for twisted tapes on 2 x 2 rod bundle inside spacer grid fitted was developed. Subsequently, a twisted tapes on 2 x 2 along the entire sub-channel, that spacer grid and the gap between spaces were evaluated through the comparison with no twist tapes and with several twist ratios (p/d = 4.2, 1.7 and 0.85). The results have revealed a strong effect of twist ratios on pressure drop and secondary flow (SF) increases with decreasing twist ratio. Moreover, the Nusselt number (Nu) is increased with Reynolds number (Re) and there is a significant improvement in the Nusselt number when a twisted tape is inserted into the entire sub-channel under the same Reynolds number. For p/d=0.85, heat transfer (Nu) enhancement of 25% and 101% was observed for twisted tapes inside spacer grid and the entire sub-channel respectively. Results showed that the pressure drop with twisted tapes inside spacer grid and the entire sub-channel are influenced by variation of twisted ratio. The highest pressure drop is achieved for the twist ratio of p/d =0.85 which is the lowest twist ratio in this study. Pressure drop showed an almost linear dependence on the twist ratios. Likewise, the secondary flow is observed to be much more pronounced when the entire channel length contained the twisted tape. Interestingly, SF seems to be peaking at the exit point of the spacer grid where the twisted tape ends. SF seems along the entire sub-channel when the entire length contained the tape. The highest SF is achieved for the twisted ratio (p/d =0.85) which is the lowest twist ratio in this study by about SF=.0.16.