Local Doppler broadening effects from thermal neutrons during transient testing
Doppler broadening refers to the changing of a nuclear cross-section as a response to kinetic energy changes from interaction on a single-nucleus level. Interactions between irradiated particles causes a change in vibration of the nucleus, which is commonly correlated to the overall material's temperature, affecting how irradiate materials interact with additional incident particles. This phenomenon poses unique problems when specifically addressing transient conditions in the Transient Reactor Test Facility (TREAT) at Idaho National Laboratories (INL) because the facility is mainly concerned with in the thermal energy range (velocities beneath 2200 m/s) interacting with a plethora of alloyed metals inserted into the experimental test train slot of the facility. This work investigates the past validation of codes for on-the-fly (OTF) Doppler broadening programs and cross references them with experiments to determine the thermal range and limitations of the TREAT facility for transient conditions. (authors)