Author Description

This proceedings volume contains papers presented at Symposium Y, "Actinides - Basic Science, Applications, and Technology" and Symposium S, "Design of Materials for Sustainable Nuclear Energy," held in San Francisco, California, April 9-13, 2012 as part of the 2012 MRS Spring Meeting. Symposium Y was the sixth in a series held biannually at the Materials Research Society Meetings. The series gathered actinide researchers from around the globe to discuss current experimental, theoretical, and modeling work, and to generally address scientific and technological issues in the field. The high level of interest in these symposia reflects both the potential renaissance in actinide science due to the potential use of nuclear energy as a non-greenhouse-gas emitting fuel, and the concerns around the dangers posed by nuclear power plants, as well as the ongoing interest in the highly unusual electronic and magnetic states in actinide materials, e.g. the heavy fermion superconductors.