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
Operations & Power
Members focus on the dissemination of knowledge and information in the area of power reactors with particular application to the production of electric power and process heat. The division sponsors meetings on the coverage of applied nuclear science and engineering as related to power plants, non-power reactors, and other nuclear facilities. It encourages and assists with the dissemination of knowledge pertinent to the safe and efficient operation of nuclear facilities through professional staff development, information exchange, and supporting the generation of viable solutions to current issues.
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!
Latest Magazine Issues
Apr 2025
Jan 2025
Latest Journal Issues
Nuclear Science and Engineering
June 2025
Nuclear Technology
Fusion Science and Technology
May 2025
Latest News
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.
Anthony L. Crawford (INL), David Estrada, Kiyo Fujimoto (Boise State Univ)
Proceedings | Nuclear Plant Instrumentation, Control, and Human-Machine Interface Technolgies (NPIC&HMIT 2019) | Orlando, FL, February 9-14, 2019 | Pages 1530-1537
This paper presents a test platform capable of applying representative in-pile thermal and monotonic, cyclic, and dynamic force loadings which induce target strain into representative in-pile components. The system’s form is that of two concentric linear delta robots and an intermediate vertical furnace. The enabled relative motion between the end effector platforms will result in enhanced performance compared to single delta or nearly any other Cartesian translational system by doubling the speed, quadrupling the workspace, and being able to actively prevent vibrational damage to its mechanical components. The employed force/torque sensors and motors are sized to apply/measure the target ranges, sensitivities, and bandwidths representative of in-pile loadings for objects of interest. The system has been designed to accommodate many in-pile geometries including a conventional (15mm OD x 12mm ID) fuel pin. Collet chucks attached to the force/torque sensors are designed to secure the pin ends as it transgresses through a furnace tube cavity allowing it to be thermally and/or force loaded. Such a configuration allows material characterization and sensor qualification/development to be performed. The system’s current configuration will have the ability to execute a comprehensive thermal and force loaded strain gauge study. Considered strain gauges in this future study will include conventional resistive strain gauges, weldable resistive strain gauges, and printed capacitive based strain gauges. The printed capacitive strain gauges being developed by this effort are of highest interest due to preliminary results indicating that their performance measures are more compatible with in-pile environments than their commercial counterparts. The test platform will be a critical element in validating the performance of the employed nuclear grade inks for aerosol jet printing, the printing and physical characterization of the printed structures, and the evaluation of sensor performance pre and post-irradiation.