The Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Program at The University of Texas at Austin received $610,000 from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission through two grants. A $450,000 award to Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering Mark Deinert, will support his research using advanced nuclear fuel cycles to dramatically reduce nuclear power’s radioactive signature. This research aims to diminish the long-standing problem of spent nuclear fuel disposal and the potential proliferation of nuclear weapons. Assistant professors Mark Deinert and Erich Schneider (Mechanical Engineering) are working on methods to recycle the radioactive elements from spent nuclear fuel in the reactors that produce them. Currently their research has shown that recycle in present-day reactors could be used to achieve more than a tenfold reduction in the overall radioactivity produced during their operation. It might be possible to extend this further if the systems appropriately optimized, they say.
The second grant of $160,000 was awarded to Assistant Profesor Schneider,in conjunction with Professor Sheldon Landersberger, Associate Professor Steven Biegalski and Dr. David Hernsberger, to develop a summer institute for nuclear engineering. The program is aimed at students in the Big Twelve Athletic Conference whose universities do not have nuclear engineering programs. The faculty of the Nuclear and Radiation Engineering program, in conjunction with their graduate students, will conduct a two week course for highly qualified students interested in a nuclear systems career. The teaching and training will extensively use the research reactor and laboratory facilities at the Nuclear Engineering Teaching Lab at the Pickle Research Campus.
