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Despite the growing use of nuclear medicine, the potential expansion of nuclear power generation, and the urgent need to protect the nation against nuclear threats and to manage nuclear wastes generated in past decades, the number of students opting to specialize in nuclear and radiochemistry has decreased significantly over the past few decades. Now, with many experts in these topics approaching retirement age, action is needed to avoid a workforce gap in these critical areas. This report investigates why the number of experts in nuclear and radiochemistry is dwindling—and sets out strategies to ensure the nation builds expertise in these topics for the future.
Since the 1970s, a steadily declining number of academic staff in nuclear and radiochemistry has led to decreases in the number of U.S. citizens with training in the fields of nuclear security, medicine, energy, environmental management, and basic research. By 2003, the number of nuclear chemistry Ph.D. degrees awarded in the United States had dropped to just four.
Decreases in nuclear and radiochemistry students come despite growing needs for experts in the field. For example, in nuclear medicine, the use of radiopharmaceuticals–radioactive molecules that can trace metabolic pathways or sites of disease—is growing fast. In these images, the CT scans show the patient’s anatomy, and the PET (positron emission tomography) scans show uptake of the radiopharmaceutical fluorodeoxyglucose, which highlights cells that are rapidly metabolizing glucose (in this case, cells of the brain and heart).
There are also needs in other areas of nuclear and radiochemistry. The nuclear energy industry is growing rapidly and research is needed to develop new chemical separation methods to produce the next generation of nuclear fuels.
Work is also ongoing to manage nuclear wastes generated in past decades. The Department of Energy oversees cleanup of 23 Office of Environmental Management sites in 14 states, and 87 Office of Legacy Management sites in 29 states.
Efforts are underway to encourage the growth of the nuclear and radiochemistry workforce. For example, in 2008 the Department of Energy created the Nuclear Energy University Program, which provides scholarships and fellowships at U.S. colleges and universities. These efforts appear to have helped stabilize the number of nuclear and radiochemistry Ph.D students and faculty members in recent years.
But the situation is fragile. About 10 percent of the nation’s experts in nuclear and radiochemistry are at or nearing retirement age (age 60+ years).
Projections indicate it is unlikely that there will be enough new Masters- and Ph.D.-level graduates with training in nuclear and radiochemistry to meet demand over the next 5 years.
The report’s authoring committee investigated why there are so few nuclear and radiochemistry students, and found that very little nuclear and radiochemistry coursework is offered to undergraduate or graduate students at U.S. universities. Out of over 100 chemistry graduate departments across the United States, the committee identified only 13 departments that have two or more faculty members who specialize in nuclear and radiochemistry and who offer one or more courses devoted entirely or in part to nuclear and radiochemistry. Only six of the top 25 ranked U.S. chemistry departments offer nuclear and radiochemistry research or coursework.
Tracking the number of nuclear and radiochemistry graduates has proven challenging. At the Ph.D. level, the Survey of Earned Doctorates questionnaire is no longer recording graduates in nuclear chemistry. Instead, the report’s authoring committee searched the ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database for theses tagged with nuclear chemistry as a topic or subject term. The number of such theses increased from 5 in 2005 to 15 in 2010, likely due to increases in funding for nuclear and radiochemistry research. However, this type of search may underestimate the number of nuclear and radiochemistry Ph.D. graduates each year: most students seemed to choose to use topic terms such as chemistry, analytical chemistry, and environmental chemistry to describe their theses, even if their projects focused on nuclear and radiochemistry.
Each year, there are more than 100 Nuclear Engineering Ph.D. graduates. These graduates could potentially fill gaps in the nuclear and radiochemistry workforce—however, students who specialize in nuclear engineering or physics usually don’t have the synthetic and analytical chemistry skills needed for tasks such as preparing reagents for nuclear medicine, developing new techniques in nuclear power generation, or removing radioactive materials from the environment.
On-the-job training is one option to equip students to carry out certain specialized roles in the nuclear and radiochemistry workforce. The large nuclear reactor-services vendor AREVA has 12 training centers in France, Germany, and the United States and offers over 500 training programs. Similarly, the Los Alamos and Livermore National Laboratories have developed specialized in-house curricula to train and mentor nuclear and radiochemistry research staff. This image shows students at the American Chemical Society’s Summer Schools in Nuclear and Radiochemistry. Source: Dave Robertson, University of Missouri
For nearly three decades, the U.S. Department of Energy has funded the American Chemical Society Division of Nuclear Chemistry and Technologies Summer Schools in Nuclear and Radiochemistry at San José State University and Brookhaven National Laboratory. The schools offer an intensive 6-week program of lectures and laboratory work that covers fundamental aspects of nuclear and radiochemistry and applications in medicine, forensics, and environmental management. Source: Dave Robertson, University of Missouri
Such training fills gaps in expertise in the short term, but does not provide the same quality of preparation and expertise as that of a Ph.D. specifically in nuclear and radiochemistry. Furthermore, the long-term health of the nuclear and radiochemistry field demands the depth of commitment of those who devote their entire careers to the discipline. The proportion of nuclear and radiochemistry faculty who are at or near retirement age has increased since 1999—in order to sustain the discipline, more Ph.D. graduates will be needed to replace them.
Based on its findings, the committee made a series of recommendations for action that both the public and private sectors can take to ensure an adequate supply of nuclear and radiochemistry expertise in the future. These recommendations call for action in three main areas of need: building structural support and collaboration between institutions, providing educational opportunities through on-the-job training, knowledge transfer, and retention; and in better data collection and tracking of the workforce.
Given the relatively small population of nuclear and radiochemists in the United States, it is essential to strengthen connections between current experts, and those who will supply and will need expertise in the future. Partnerships between the larger nuclear and radiochemistry programs at universities and national laboratories, and programs of colleges, research institutes, medical facilities, and industry would help ensure an adequate supply of faculty, staff, students and postdoctoral fellows to satisfy both current and future professional and academic needs. Credit: Dave Robertson, University of Missouri
Educational programs are needed to develop experts for critical and time-sensitive jobs. In many sectors, the need for specialists or “on-the-job” training—whether for new Bachelor’s degree holders or for mid-career scientists changing fields—cannot be met by the traditional academic system, because of the immediacy or classified nature of the work. Other types of educational program are needed to supply these types of training. With a large number of specialized nuclear and radiochemistry experts who are eligible to retire in the next five to ten years, a process is necessary to minimize the impact of losing many years of experience. Developing procedures to formalize knowledge retention and transfer would help overcome this challenge, especially at the national laboratories. Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory Summer Schools in Nuclear and Radiochemistry