As global conferences engage leaders in the nuclear field at the highest political level, we recognize that the forums of the future will be populated by the young scientists and professionals of today. The millennial generation faces the most compelling of problems across the spectrum of nuclear science and security policy – ranging from the crafting of an effective nuclear security architecture as the Review Conference for the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons looms, to the crippling inaction in nuclear waste disposal as evident in the recent suspension of the annual nuclear waste fee and termination of the Yucca Mountain repository program. Compounding these are contentions over enrichment and safeguards, concerns over radiation levels following the Fukushima nuclear disaster, and conflict over the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel.

As these collectively coerce the clock forward, the Nuclear Policy Working Group (NPWG) has launched The Midnight Watch, a blog detailing our efforts to  educate and train the millennial generation on issues at the interface of nuclear science, technology and policy. Via workshops and seminars, student-led courses and research teams, the NPWG approaches each issue founded in fundamental nuclear science within the current political schema. We unite those early in their undergraduate careers with those seasoned in the field across a number of institutions that span the nation. We take the passions of each member and cultivate them through this multidisciplinary lens, working towards generating policy recommendations to anatomize these global disputes.