The Nuclear Science Center is not just a research facility — it’s also an educational facility.

How students use the NSC

Students in the Department of Nuclear Engineering at Texas A&M use the NSC’s reactor labs in their NUEN 405 and NUEN 606 courses. The students use the reactor to answer complex questions about reactor theory. Students operate the reactor under instruction and conduct self-directed design projects at the NSC.

Students also have to opportunity to obtain reactor operator licenses or duty health physicist certification.

But it’s not just nuclear engineering students using our facility. As part of an environmental controls section in one of their courses, students in the Texas A&M Department of Civil Engineering use the facility to learn about how we control the airflow into and out of the building. We have a system that shuts down all airflow if any radioactivity gets into the air, thus keeping the radioactive material in the building and away from the public. The system is automatic, with a variety of detection capabilities. Students learn how we control this airflow system.