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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 541 records · Page 30
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2018

Mapping of crown rust resistance gene Pc53 in oat ( Avena sativa )

Crown rust disease caused by the fungus Puccinia coronata f. sp. avenae ( Pca ) is a major production constraint of oat in North America, Europe, and Australia. There are over 100 genes effective against one or more Pca races, but only a handful of seedling resistance ( Pc ) genes have been mapped to a known chromosomal location. The goal of the present study was to use linkage mapping to identify the genomic location of the Pc53 gene, and to produce a list of linked SNPs with potential as molecular markers for marker assisted breeding. The Pc53 gene was placed on the linkage group Mrg08 at 82.4 cM using F 5 -derived recombinant inbred lines (RILs) from a cross between the Pc53 carrier 6-112-1-15 (PI 311624) and the susceptible cultivar Otana. The map location was validated using RILs from a cross between 6-112-1-15 and the Pc50 differential line. Single nucleotide polymorphism marker GMI_ES02_c14533_567 was the closest to Pc53 . A major seedling resistance gene ‘ PcKM ’ and QTL QcC . Core . 08 . 1 , QCr . Core . 08 . 2 , QCr . Core . 08 . 3 and QCr . cdl9-12D were previously reported on Mrg08. QPc . Core . 08 . 1 and PcKM were mapped to within 1 cM of Pc53 ; but previous virulence studies have indicated separate identities. The chromosomal location of Pc53 and SNPs linked with it will facilitate the utilization of Pc53 in oat breeding programs.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2012

TEMPERATURE MONITORING OPTIONS AVAILABLE AT THE IDAHO NATIONAL LABORATORY ADVANCED TEST REACTOR

As part of the Advanced Test Reactor National Scientific User Facility (ATR NSUF) program, the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has developed in-house capabilities to fabricate, test, and qualify new and enhanced sensors for irradiation testing. To meet recent customer requests, an array of temperature monitoring options is now available to ATR users. The method selected is determined by test requirements and budget. Melt wires are the simplest and least expensive option for monitoring temperature. INL has recently verified the melting temperature of a collection of materials with melt temperatures ranging from 100 to 1000 C with a differential scanning calorimeter installed at INL’s High Temperature Test Laboratory (HTTL). INL encapsulates these melt wires in quartz or metal tubes. In the case of quartz tubes, multiple wires can be encapsulated in a single 1.6 mm diameter tube. The second option available to ATR users is a silicon carbide temperature monitor. The benefit of this option is that a single small monitor (typically 1 mm x 1 mm x 10 mm or 1 mm diameter x 10 mm length) can be used to detect peak irradiation temperatures ranging from 200 to 800 C. Equipment has been installed at INL’s HTTL to complete post-irradiation resistivity measurements on SiC monitors, a technique that has been found to yield the most accurate temperatures from these monitors. For instrumented tests, thermocouples may be used. In addition to Type-K and Type-N thermocouples, a High Temperature Irradiation Resistant ThermoCouple (HTIR-TC) was developed at the HTTL that contains commercially-available doped molybdenum paired with a niobium alloy thermoelements. Long duration high temperature tests, in furnaces and in the ATR and other MTRs, demonstrate that the HTIR-TC is accurate up to 1800 C and insensitive to thermal neutron interactions. Thus, degradation observed at temperatures above 1100 C with Type K and N thermocouples and decalibration due to transmutation with tungsten-rhenium and platinum rhodium thermocouples can be avoided. INL is also developing an Ultrasonic Thermometry (UT) capability. In addition to small size, UT’s offer several potential advantages over other temperature sensors. Measurements may be made near the melting point of the sensor material, potentially allowing monitoring of temperatures up to 3000 C. In addition, because no electrical insulation is required, shunting effects are avoided. Most attractive, however, is the ability to introduce acoustic discontinuities to the sensor, as this enables temperature measurements at several points along the sensor length. As discussed in this paper, the suite of temperature monitors offered by INL is not only available to ATR users, but also to users at other MTRs.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2024

GPU-enabled extreme-scale turbulence simulations: Fourier pseudo-spectral algorithms at the exascale using OpenMP offloading

Fourier pseudo-spectral methods for nonlinear partial differential equations are of wide interest in many areas of advanced computational science, including direct numerical simulation of three-dimensional (3-D) turbulence governed by the Navier-Stokes equations in fluid dynamics. This paper presents a new capability for simulating turbulence at a new record resolution up to 35 trillion grid points, on the world's first exascale computer, Frontier, comprising AMD MI250x GPUs with HPE's Slingshot interconnect and operated by the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF). Key programming strategies designed to take maximum advantage of the machine architecture involve performing almost all computations on the GPU which has the same memory capacity as the CPU, performing all-to-all communication among sets of parallel processes directly on the GPU, and targeting GPUs efficiently using OpenMP offloading for intensive number-crunching including 1-D Fast Fourier Transforms (FFT) performed using AMD ROCm library calls. With 99% of computing power on Frontier being on the GPU, leaving the CPU idle leads to a net performance gain via avoiding the overhead of data movement between host and device except when needed for some I/O purposes. Memory footprint including the size of communication buffers for MPI_ALLTOALL is managed carefully to maximize the largest problem size possible for a given node count. Detailed performance data including separate contributions from different categories of operations to the elapsed wall time per step are reported for five grid resolutions, from 2048 3 on a single node to 32768 3 on 4096 or 8192 nodes out of 9408 on the system. Both 1D and 2D domain decompositions which divide a 3D periodic domain into slabs and pencils respectively are implemented. The present code suite (labeled by the acronym GESTS, GPUs for Extreme Scale Turbulence Simulations) achieves a figure of merit (in grid points per second) exceeding goals set in the Center for Accelerated Application Readiness (CAAR) program for Frontier. The performance attained is highly favorable in both weak scaling and strong scaling, with notable departures only for 2048 3 where communication is entirely intra-node, and for 32768 3 , where a challenge due to small message sizes does arise. Communication performance is addressed further using a lightweight test code that performs all-to-all communication in a manner matching the full turbulence simulation code. Performance at large problem sizes is affected by both small message size due to high node counts as well as dragonfly network topology features on the machine, but is consistent with official expectations of sustained performance on Frontier. Overall, although not perfect, the scalability achieved at the extreme problem size of 32768 3 (and up to 8192 nodes — which corresponds to hardware rated at just under 1 exaflop/sec of theoretical peak computational performance) is arguably better than the scalability observed using prior state-of-the-art algorithms on Frontier's predecessor machine (Summit) at OLCF. New science results for the study of intermittency in turbulence enabled by this code and its extensions are to be reported separately in the near future.

3D fast Fourier transform↗
DOE OSTI2014

SU-E-I-78: Improving Prostatic Delineation Using Dual-Energy CT

Purpose: Visual prostatic definition is difficult using conventional CT. This is because the prostate is surrounded closely with tissue of similar electron density. Definition is further hindered when the region contains high-Z material (such as fiducial markers). Dual-energy CT (DECT) is a technique where images are rendered using two tube voltages during a single scan session. This study evaluates DECT as a means of improving prostatic volume delineation for radiation oncology. Methods: The patients were scanned using a Definition AS20 (Siemens Healthcare, Malvern, PA). This device uses a single-tube configuration, where two scans of differing energies are performed in serial. The scans are acquired with tube voltage of 80kVp and 140kVp. Following acquisition, these scan data were used to generate effective monoenergetic scans ranging from 40keV to 190keV. In the current study, the data were presented to observers using a novel program, which allows real-time adjustment of window, level, and effective keV; all while scrolling through volumetric slices. Three patients were scanned, each with a different high-contrast material in or around the prostate: I-125 seeds, gold fiducial markers, and prostatic calcifications. These images are compared to a weighted average of the 80kVp and 140kVP scans, which yield a scan similar to that of a 120 kVp scan, which is a common tube voltage in radiation oncology. Results: Prostatic definition improved in each case. Differentiation of soft tissue from surrounding adipose improved with lower keV, while higher keV provided a reduction of high-z artifacts. Furthermore, the dynamic adjustment of the keV allowed observers to better recognize regions of differing tissue composition within this relatively homogeneous area. Conclusion: By simultaneously providing the observer with the benefits of high-energy images and low-energy images, and allowing adjustment in real-time, improved imaging in highly homogeneous regions such as the male pelvis is achievable.

60 APPLIED LIFE SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2019

Certification and User Manual for A 5kW Heat Exchanger Test Loop at Low Temperatures and High-Pressures

Yankee Scientific has designed and built a custom heat exchanger test stand (HXTS), for Oak Ridge National Laboratory, to support a program to develop advanced heat exchangers (HX) for geothermal Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) power plants under Subcontract Number 40000141544 with ORNL. The test stand was designed to measure the performance of laboratory scale sub-sections of these advanced heat exchangers. Provisions have been made to facilitate testing the advanced heat exchanger as a primary refrigerant vaporizer and as a recuperator and as the system condenser. The test loop was operated with a controller and was instrumented with 11 thermocouples, 5 pressure gauges, 2 pressure transducers, 2 differential pressure transducers, and 3 flow meters.

15 GEOTHERMAL ENERGY↗
DOE OSTI2022

Proposed Methodology for Evaluating and Validating TSLs [Slides]

This presentation begins by providing an overview of the research and discusses recent efforts in validating thermal neutron scattering cross sections, including differential cross section measurements at ORNL for evaluation and validation, total cross section measurements at RPI, pulsed-neutron die-away experiments at LLNL, and integral criticality experiments by LLNL. The presentation also proposes a methodology not only for validating thermal scattering files that utilizes all available experimental data, but also for evaluating new libraries as demonstrated on polystyrene. In conclusion, polystyrene evaluation was conducted using multiple experiments, including differential and integral. The proposed methodology has been shown to improve neutron transport and files have been submitted to NNDC for inclusion in ENDF/B-VIII.1 release. MCT-012 & PCM-002 has been relatively insensitive to changes in $\mathcal{S}(α,β)$. The research found that differences in differential results don’t always propagate to differences in integral results, hence why evaluation of differential data important. Future work on the project is also discussed.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2024

A genetic screen for dominant chloroplast reactive oxygen species signaling mutants reveals life stage-specific singlet oxygen signaling networks

Plants employ intricate molecular mechanisms to respond to abiotic stresses, which often lead to the accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) within organelles such as chloroplasts. Such ROS can produce stress signals that regulate cellular response mechanisms. One ROS, singlet oxygen ( 1 O 2 ), is predominantly produced in the chloroplast during photosynthesis and can trigger chloroplast degradation, programmed cell death (PCD), and retrograde (organelle-to-nucleus) signaling. However, little is known about the molecular mechanisms involved in these signaling pathways or how many different signaling 1 O 2 pathways may exist. The Arabidopsis thaliana plastid ferrochelatase two (fc2) mutant conditionally accumulates chloroplast 1 O 2 , making fc2 a valuable genetic system for studying chloroplast 1 O 2 -initiated signaling. Here, we have used activation tagging in a new forward genetic screen to identify eight dominant fc2 activation-tagged (fas) mutations that suppress chloroplast 1 O 2 -initiated PCD. While 1 O 2 -triggered PCD is blocked in all fc2 fas mutants in the adult stage, such cellular degradation in the seedling stage is blocked in only two mutants. This differential blocking of PCD suggests that life-stage-specific 1 O 2 -response pathways exist. In addition to PCD, fas mutations generally reduce 1 O 2 -induced retrograde signals. Furthermore, fas mutants have enhanced tolerance to excess light, a natural mechanism to produce chloroplast 1 O 2 . However, general abiotic stress tolerance was only observed in one fc2 fas mutant (fc2 fas2). Together, this suggests that plants can employ general stress tolerance mechanisms to overcome 1 O 2 production but that this screen was mostly specific to 1 O 2 signaling. We also observed that salicylic acid (SA) and jasmonate (JA) stress hormone response marker genes were induced in 1 O 2 -stressed fc2 and generally reduced by fas mutations, suggesting that SA and JA signaling is correlated with active 1 O 2 signaling and PCD. Together, this work highlights the complexity of 1 O 2 signaling by demonstrating that multiple pathways may exist and introduces a suite of new 1 O 2 signaling mutants to investigate the mechanisms controlling chloroplast-initiated degradation, PCD, and retrograde signaling.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2015

CHARACTERIZING THE ATMOSPHERES OF THE HR8799 PLANETS WITH HST/WFC3

We present results from a Hubble Space Telescope (HST) program characterizing the atmospheres of the outer two planets in the HR8799 system. The images were taken over 15 orbits in three near-infrared (near-IR) medium-band filters—F098M, F127M, and F139M—using the Wide Field Camera 3. One of the three filters is sensitive to a water absorption band inaccessible from ground-based observations, providing a unique probe of the thermal emission from the atmospheres of these young giant planets. The observations were taken at 30 different spacecraft rolls to enable angular differential imaging (ADI), and the full data set was analyzed with the Karhunen–Loéve Image Projection routine, an advanced image processing algorithm adapted to work with HST data. To achieve the required high contrast at subarcsecond resolution, we utilized the pointing accuracy of HST in combination with an improved pipeline designed to combine the dithered ADI data with an algorithm designed to both improve the image resolution and accurately measure the photometry. The results include F127M (J) detections of the outer planets, HR8799b and c, and the first detection of HR8799b in the water-band (F139M) filter. The F127M photometry for HR8799c agrees well with fitted atmospheric models, resolving the longstanding difficulty in consistently modeling the near-IR flux of the planet.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2011

Combined analysis of neutron and photon flux measurements for the Jules Horowitz reactor core mapping

We study the combined analysis of nuclear measurements to improve the knowledge of the irradiation conditions in the experimental locations of the future Jules Horowitz Reactor (JHR). The goal of the present work is to measure more accurately neutron flux, photon flux and nuclear heating in the reactor. In a Material Testing Reactor (MTR), nuclear heating is a crucial parameter to design the experimental devices to be irradiated in harsh nuclear conditions. This parameter drives the temperature of the devices and of the samples. The numerical codes can predict this parameter but in-situ measurements are necessary to reach the expected accuracy. For this reason, one objective of the IN-CORE program [1] is to study the combined measurements of neutron and photon flux and their cross advanced interpretation. It should be reminded that both neutron and photon sensors are not totally selective as their signals are due to neutron and photon interactions. We intend to measure the neutron flux by three different kinds of sensors (Uranium Fission chamber, Plutonium Fission chamber and Self Powered Neutron Detector), the photon flux by two different sensors (Ionization chamber and Self Powered Gamma Detector) and the nuclear heating by two different ones (Differential calorimeter and Gamma Thermometer). For the same parameter, we expect that the use of different kinds of sensors will allow a better estimation of the aimed parameter by mixing different spectrum responses and different neutron and gamma contributions. An experimental test called CARMEN-1 is scheduled in OSIRIS reactor (CEA Saclay - France) at the end of 2011, with the goal to map irradiation locations in the reactor reflector to get a first validation of the analysis model. This article focuses on the sensor selection for CARMEN-1 experiment and to the way to link neutron and photon flux measurements in view to reduce their uncertainties but also to better assess the neutron and photon contributions to nuclear heating. (authors)

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗
DOE OSTI2017

Production of Sulfur Allotropes in Electron Irradiated Jupiter Trojans Ice Analogs

In this paper, we investigate sulfur chemistry in laboratory analogs of Jupiter Trojans and Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs). Electron irradiation experiments of CH{sub 3}OH–NH{sub 3}–H{sub 2}O and H{sub 2}S–CH{sub 3}OH–NH{sub 3}–H{sub 2}O ices were conducted to better understand the chemical differences between primordial planetesimals inside and outside the sublimation line of H{sub 2}S. The main goal of this work is to test the chemical plausibility of the hypothesis correlating the color bimodality in Jupiter Trojans with sulfur chemistry in the incipient solar system. Temperature programmed desorption (TPD) of the irradiated mixtures allows the detection of small sulfur allotropes (S{sub 3} and S{sub 4}) after the irradiation of H{sub 2}S containing ice mixtures. These small, red polymers are metastable and could polymerize further under thermal processing and irradiation, producing larger sulfur polymers (mainly S{sub 8}) that are spectroscopically neutral at wavelengths above 500 nm. This transformation may affect the spectral reflectance of Jupiter Trojans in a different way compared to KBOs, thereby providing a useful framework for possibly differentiating and determining the formation and history of small bodies. Along with allotropes, we report the production of organo-sulfur molecules. Sulfur molecules produced in our experiment have been recently detected by Rosetta in the coma of 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The very weak absorption of sulfur polymers in the infrared range hampers their identification on Trojans and KBOs, but these allotropes strongly absorb light at UV and Visible wavelengths. This suggests that high signal-to-noise ratio UV–Vis spectra of these objects could provide new constraints on their presence.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Threshold charmonium photoproduction with GlueX

Exclusive charmonium photoproduction near threshold opens the door for studying the gluonic properties of the proton: gluonic GPDs, anomalous contribution to the mass of the proton, gravitational form factors, the mass radius of the proton. However, such an ambitious program requires precise measurements to validate the theoretical assumptions that relate the experimental results to the above quantities. The first total cross-section measurements of near-threshold exclusive J/? photoproduction (?p?J/?p) by the GlueX collaboration sparked remarkable theoretical interest, however had limited statistics. We will report new total cross-section results based on more than a four-fold increase in statistics. Even more, due to the full acceptance of the GlueX experiment for this reaction, we will present first measurements of the differential cross-sections over the whole near-threshold kinematic region. Such measurements enable more general conclusions about the reaction mechanism when compared to a wide range of theoretical predictions including GPD calculations and models with open-charm intermediate states.

Pentchev, Lubomir↗
DOE OSTI2020

Bayesian Monte Carlo Evaluation Framework for Cross Sections Nuclear Data and Integral Benchmark Experiments

The new Bayesian Monte Carlo (MC) evaluation framework described in this abstract has been conceived as an attempt to improve nuclear data evaluations of differential crosssection data by removing the following two approximations conventionally employed for nuclear data evaluations: all probability density functions (PDFs) of all data and model parameters, both prior and posterior, are assumed to be normal (i.e., Gaussian) PDFs, and all uncertainties and covariances are propagated using a linear approximation. With these approximations removed, the Bayesian MC (BMC) framework could be used to account for nonlinear effects and would enable improved evaluations of differential cross sections and IBE data that are presently performed based on the assumptions itemized above. The BMC would also improve upon the uniform sampling of IBE parameters from within ranges defined by their evaluated uncertainties.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2015

Mechanical response and microprocesses of reconsolidating crushed salt at elevated temperature

Design, analysis and performance assessment of potential salt repositories for heat-generating nuclear waste require knowledge of thermal, mechanical, and fluid transport properties of reconsolidating granular salt. So, to inform salt repository evaluations, we have undertaken an experimental program to determine Bulk and Young’s moduli and Poisson’s ratio of reconsolidated granular salt as a function of porosity and temperature and to establish the deformational processes by which the salt reconsolidates. Our tests were conducted at 100, 175, and 250 °C. In hydrostatic tests, confining pressure is increased to 20 MPa with periodic unload/reload loops to determine K. Volume strain increases with increasing temperature. In shear tests at 2.5 and 5 MPa confining pressure, after confining pressure is applied, the crushed salt is subjected to a differential stress, with periodic unload/reload loops to determine E and ν. At predetermined differential stress levels the stress is held constant and the salt consolidates. Displacement gages mounted on the samples show little lateral deformation until the samples reach a porosity of ~10 %. Interestingly, vapor is vented only for 250 °C tests and condenses at the vent port. It is hypothesized that the brine originates from fluid inclusions, which were made accessible by heating and intragranular deformational processes including decrepitation. Furthermore, identification and documentation of consolidation processes are inferred from optical and scanning electron microstructural observations. As a result, densification at low porosity is enhanced by water film on grain boundaries that enables solution-precipitation phenomena.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2021

Integration of Dynamical System Scaling to RAVEN and Facility Application

As part of the design optimization and model validation effort within the hybrid energy systems program, the research to implement dynamical system scaling (DSS) code to RAVEN is funded under the Integrated Energy System program in collaboration with the Digital Reactor Technology & Development department. The DSS data processing algorithm has been coded within the RAVEN framework along with other metrics and postprocessing models. The implemented code was tested using a gravity-driven draining tank draining case modeled in RELAP5-3D and generated data was successfully postprocessed based on the scaling analyses defined by DSS. Postprocessed data concluded less agreement for the tank exit velocity and indicated that the modeled input deck for RELAP5-3D requires modification to enforce minimal pressure differential effects to the draining process.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2019

Nuclear Data and Benchmarking Program: Nuclear Data Performance Assessment for Advanced Reactors

Over the last several Evaluated Nuclear Data File (ENDF)/B releases, many updates have been introduced to the nuclear data libraries that can significantly change computational results. These changes can be particularly important for advanced reactor concepts, which are not as thoroughly investigated as those used in light water reactor (LWR) systems. Therefore, a performance assessment of the ENDF/B libraries using the SCALE 6.2.3 code package was conducted under the auspices of the U.S., Department of Energy Office of Nuclear Energy (DOE-NE). The following systems relevant to the advanced reactor community were chosen as subject for investigation in this report: sodium cooled fast reactor systems, graphite moderated high temperature gas-cooled reactors, and several molten salt reactor models. At first, the similarity of the integral performance of the ENDF/B-VII.1 and ENDF/B-VIII.0 nuclear data libraries caused by compensating errors in important differential data was demonstrated. In calculations for a shipping container of high-assay low enriched uranium, the data of individual isotopes were systematically swapped between the two ENDF/B libraries. An eigenvalue difference of up to 450 pcm was found due to the use of 235 U and 238 U from one library and 1 H and 16 O from the other library. This clearly demonstrates a cross-correlation between reaction data sets of different isotopes within a library that should be reported in the evaluations. For sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR) fuel assemblies, significant eigenvalue (k inf ) differences (200– 450 pcm) were found between calculations using the 2011 ENDF/B-VII.1 data and 2018 ENDF/B-VIII.0 data. These differences were mainly caused by updates of 238 U and 239 Pu neutron cross sections. Results from the multigroup (MG) calculations further revealed that the group structure of the applied MG library strongly influences the MG bias due to the importance of an appropriate energy resolution of the resonances in higher energy ranges. The application of previously used MG libraries requires new verification for advanced reactor simulation in comparisons with reference continuous-energy calculations. Nuclear data uncertainty analyses of these SFR systems resulted in eigenvalue uncertainties between 1,400 and 1,800 pcm, which are three to four times higher than corresponding uncertainties in light water reactor (LWR) systems. The main contributor to this uncertainty was found to be inelastic scattering on 238 U, which shows an uncertainty of up to 50% in the fast energy range. Other important contributors are the scattering reactions of 56 Fe and 23 Na which have so far not appeared in LWR analysis. Since the largest contribution to the eigenvalue uncertainty of SFR systems is coming from scattering reactions, it is expected that uncertainties in the angular scattering distributions also have a significant impact. Those uncertainties are, however, not available for the majority of nuclides, and the capabilities to determine sensitivities to this data are currently underdeveloped. For two graphite moderated high temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) benchmarks, only the ENDF/BVII. 1 calculations resulted in consistent eigenvalues (k eff ) with the corresponding experimental measurements. Eigenvalue differences of about 1,000 pcm were found between the 2006 ENDF/B-VII.0 data and the 2011 ENDF/B-VII.1 data, primarily due to an updated carbon capture cross section in the thermal energy range in the later ENDF/B release. The ENDF/B-VIII.0 eigenvalue was larger than the ENDF/B-VII.1 eigenvalue by about 300 pcm mainly due to updates in multiple 235 U neutron cross sections, with offsetting updates in the 238 U cross sections. With ENDF/B-VIII.0, graphite can be modeled as perfect crystal or with two different porosities. The choice of the graphite evaluation can have a significant influence of the eigenvalue. For a HTGR benchmark, maximum eigenvalue differences as high as 650 pcm due to different porosities were observed. More detailed studies of the impact of the porosity are necessary while considering that the graphite porosity can vary between the used materials and changes as a function of neutron fluence. xii The uncertainty of the HTGR eigenvalues due to nuclear data uncertainties was found between 500 and 600 pcm, with the top contributor being the neutron multiplicity of 235 U. A gap in the form of missing uncertainties in graphite thermal scattering data, that might have significant impact on HTGR reactors, was identified. This gap is being investigated by the DOE-NE Nuclear Data and Benchmarking Program, as documented in a separate report The fast spectrum molten salt reactor calculations revealed similar comparisons as for the SFR assemblies. The eigenvalue uncertainties were significantly influenced by inelastic scattering on 238 U, while the impact of angular scattering distributions is unknown. For the graphite and zirconium hydride moderated system, eigenvalue uncertainties of up to 700 pcm were observed, requiring in depth analyses of the cross sections and corresponding uncertainties of the included materials. In general, it was observed that the flux spectra of the various molten salt reactor systems show significant differences, even between a fresh state and a depleted state. The choice of the energy group structure of MG calculations is therefore highly relevant; the applicability of previously used MG libraries needs to be verified. Due the unavailability of pin power measurements of advanced reactor systems, pin power calculations with both ENDF/B-VII.1 and VIII.0 data were performed for a light water reactor and compared to corresponding measurements. Both calculations show good agreement with the measurements. A comparison between the ENDF/B-VII.1 and VIII.0 results revealed small differences, mostly in the range of about 0.2%.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗
DOE OSTI2025

A critical analysis of U-Pu-Zr phase transitions using calorimetric, microstructural, and phase equilibria data

Metallic fuels consisting primarily of uranium, plutonium, and zirconium (U-Pu-Zr) are a leading material candidate for fast-spectrum nuclear reactors. Early demonstration programs proved the principle of safe and efficient fast reactor operation, however there is still considerable uncertainty regarding the phase equilibria and microstructural evolution across the ternary composition space. Quantitative phase formation and identification measurements are scarce and often incomplete, with studies reporting either phase transition temperatures or phase identification data, but not both from the same specimens. In this study, we critically compared experimental and calculated phase transition data and correlated with the microstructure and phase characterization data of as-cast and annealed U-Pu-Zr alloys. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) was used to measure phase transitions in the subsolidus regions (723−948 K) of three ternary U-Pu-Zr alloys with similar plutonium concentrations but various U/Zr ratios. Due to sluggish kinetics and narrow ranges of phase stability, complex peaks required the use of a Frazier-Suzuki peak fitting algorithm to deconvolute and calculate transition peak temperatures and enthalpies. We also identified trends of phase transition behavior by critically comparing our DSC data with previous phase transition measurements as well as historical and calculated phase equilibrium diagrams. In conclusion, this provides a critical approach for benchmarking and assessing the quality of new U-Pu-Zr phase equilibria data prior to its incorporation into nuclear material databases.

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗
DOE OSTI2014

Non-linear dynamic characteristics and optimal control of giant magnetostrictive film subjected to in-plane stochastic excitation

The non-linear dynamic characteristics and optimal control of a giant magnetostrictive film (GMF) subjected to in-plane stochastic excitation were studied. Non-linear differential items were introduced to interpret the hysteretic phenomena of the GMF, and the non-linear dynamic model of the GMF subjected to in-plane stochastic excitation was developed. The stochastic stability was analysed, and the probability density function was obtained. The condition of stochastic Hopf bifurcation and noise-induced chaotic response were determined, and the fractal boundary of the system's safe basin was provided. The reliability function was solved from the backward Kolmogorov equation, and an optimal control strategy was proposed in the stochastic dynamic programming method. Numerical simulation shows that the system stability varies with the parameters, and stochastic Hopf bifurcation and chaos appear in the process; the area of the safe basin decreases when the noise intensifies, and the boundary of the safe basin becomes fractal; the system reliability improved through stochastic optimal control. Finally, the theoretical and numerical results were proved by experiments. The results are helpful in the engineering applications of GMF.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗