• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.10
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• pp.3909-3918
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• 2022

In the event of a severe accident, the reactor core may melt due to insufficient cooling. the high-temperature core melt will have a strong interaction (FCI) with the coolant, which may lead to steam explosion. Steam explosion would pose a serious threat to the safety of the reactors. Therefore, the study of steam explosion is of great significance to the assessment of severe accidents in nuclear reactors. This research focuses on the development of a two-dimensional steam explosion integrated analysis code called SEINA. Based on the semi-implicit Euler scheme, the three-phase field was considered in this code. Besides, the influence of evaporation drag of melt and the influence of solidified shell during the process of melt droplet fragmentation were also considered. The code was simulated and validated by FARO L-14 and KROTOS KS-2 experiments. The calculation results of SEINA code are in good agreement with the experimental results, and the results show that if the effects of evaporation drag and melt solidification shell are considered, the FCI process can be described more accurately. Therefore, it is proved that SEINA has the potential to be a powerful and effective tool for the analysis of steam explosions in nuclear reactors.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.7
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• pp.2184-2194
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• 2021

The Free-Piston Stirling engine (FPSE) is of interest for many research in aerospace due to its advantages of long operating life, higher efficiency, and zero maintenance. In this study, a 1-kW FPSE was proposed by analyzing the requirements of Space Reactor Power Systems (SRPS), of which performance was evaluated by developing a code through the Simple Analysis Method. The results of SAM showed that the critical parameters of FPSE could satisfy the designed requirements. The heater of the FPSE was designed with the copper rectangular fins to enhance heat transfer, and the parametric study of the heater was performed with Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software STAR-CCM⁺. The Performance Evaluation Criteria (PEC) was used to evaluate the heat transfer enhancement of the fins in the heater. The numerical results of the CFD program showed that pressure drop and Nusselt number ratio had a linear growth with the height of fins, and PEC number decreased as the height of fins increased, and the optimum height of the fin was set as 4 mm according to the minimum heat exchange surface area. This paper can provide theoretical supports for the design and numerical analysis of an FPSE for SRPSs.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.12
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• pp.3910-3917
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• 2021

Reactor fuel's power distribution plays a vital role in designing the new generation thermionic Space Reactor Power Systems (SRPS). In this paper, the 1/12th SPACE-R's full reactor core was numerically analyzed with two kinds of different axial power distribution, to identify their impacts on thermal-hydraulic and thermoelectric characteristics. In the benchmark study, the maximum error between numerical results and existing data or design values ranged from 0.2 to 2.2%. Four main conclusions were obtained in the numerical analysis: a) The axial power distribution has less impact on coolant temperature. b) Axial power distribution influenced the emitter temperature distribution a lot, when the core power was cosine distributed, the maximum temperature of the emitter was 194 K higher than that of the uniform power distribution. c) Comparing to the cosine axial power distribution, the uniform axial power distribution would make the maximum temperature in each component of the reactor core much lower, reducing the requirements for core fuel material. d) Voltage and current distribution were similar to the axial electrode temperature distribution, and the axial power distribution has little effect on the output power.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.8
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• pp.2997-3009
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• 2023

The Passive containment Air-cooling System (PAS) can effectively remove the decay heat of the modular small nuclear reactor after an accident. The details of natural convection around the dome, which is a key part of PAS, were investigated numerically in the present study. The thermal dynamics around the dome were studied through the temperature, pressure and velocity contours and the streamlines. Additionally, the formation of the buoyant plume at the top of the dome was investigated. The results show that with the increase of Ra, the lift-off point moves toward the bottom of the dome, and the eddy under the buoyant plume grows larger gradually, which enhances the heat transfer. And the heat transfer along the dome surface with different truncation angles was investigated. As the angle increases, the heat transfer coefficient becomes stronger as well. Consequently, a newly developed heat transfer correlation considering the influence of truncation angle for the dome is proposed based on the simulated results. This study could provide a better understanding of natural convection around the dome of PAS and the proposed correlation could also offer more predictive value in the improvement of nuclear safety.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.92-101
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• 1996

In a gasoline engine, the characteristics of air flow is very important not only for the design of the intake system geometry bout also for the accurate measurement of the induction air mass. In this study, an air flow rate measurement of the induction air mass. In this study, an air flow rate measurement was conducted by using the hot wire flow meter at the upstream of the intake port and the throttle. At the upstream of the throttle, the overshoot phenomena of the air flow rate by fast throttle opening were analyzed with choked flow. At the upstream of the intake port, the cylinder variation of the air flow rate and the difference between fast throttle opening and closing were showed during the unsteady state by the throttle step change. The results of this study can be used for the design of the throttle valve geometry and cylinder by cylinder control.

• International Journal of Vascular Biomedical Engineering
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.13-19
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• 2003

Endothelial release of nitric oxide (NO) contributes to the regulation of vascular tone by inducing vascular relaxation. To estimate the blood flow-dependent nitric oxide level and half-life (T1/2) of nitric oxide in vivo state, we investigated the change of aortic NO currents during the change of aortic blood flow rate using NO-selective electrode system and electromagnetic flowmeter in the aorta of anesthetized rats. Resting mean aortic blood flow rate was $49.6{\pm}5.6ml/min$ in the anesthetized rats. NO currents in the aorta were increased by the elevation of blood pressure and/or blood flow rate. When the aortic blood flow was occluded by the clamping, aortic NO currents were decreased. The difference of NO concentration between resting state and occluded state was $1.34{\pm}0.26{\mu}M$ (n=7). This NO concentration was estimated as blood flow-dependent nitric oxide concentration in the rats. Also, while the aortic blood flow was occluded, NO currents were decreased with exponential pattern with $12.84{\pm}2.15$ seconds of time constant and $7.70{\pm}1.07$ seconds of half-life. To summarize, this study suggested that blood flow-dependent NO concentration and half-life of nitric oxide were about $1.3{\mu}M$ and 7.7 seconds, respectively, in the aorta of anesthetized rats. The nitric oxide-selective electrode system is useful for the direct and continuous measurement of NO in vivo state.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2008.11b
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• pp.3038-3043
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• 2008

Tumble or swirl flow is used adequately to promote mixing of air and fuel in the cylinder and to enlarge turbulent intensity in the late time of compression stroke. However, since in-cylinder flow is a kind of transient state with rapid flow variation, that is, non-steady state flow, swirl or tumble flow has not been analyzed sufficiently and not been recognized whether they are available for combustion theoretically yet. In the investigation of intake turbulent characteristics using PIV method, different flow characteristics were showed according to SCV figures. SCV installed engine had higher vorticity, turbulent strength by fluctuation and turbulent kinetic energy than a baseline engine, especially around the wall and lower part of the cylinder. Consequently, as swirl flow was added to existing tumble flow, it was found that fluctuation component increased and flow energy was conserved effectively through the experiment.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2002.08a
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• pp.245-248
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• 2002

Vortex lock-on or resonance in the flow behind a circular cylinder is visualized by a time-resolved PIV when a single frequency oscillation is superimposed on the mean incident velocity. Measurements are made of the $K{\'{a}}rm{\'{a}}n$ vortices in the wake-transition regime at the Reynolds number 360. Basically, natural shedding state is observed to compare with lock-on state. Wake motion by the change of the shedding frequency of lock-on state is investigated. When lock-on occurs, the vortex shedding frequency is found to be half the oscillation frequency as expected from previous experiments. The physical flow phenomena of natural shedding and lock-on states are analyzed with physical parameters of recirculation and vortex formation region. Consequently, it is found that the change of wake bubble plays an important role in the flow at the lock-on state. Vortex formation region is also actively changed like recirculation region as the lock-on occurs. Therefore, it is deduced that the recirculation region is closely related with the vortex formation region.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.267-273
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• 2020

This Hydrokinetic energy system is the process of extracting energy from rivers, canals and others sources to generate small scale electrical energy for decentralized usage. This study investigates the application of Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in Geographical Information System (GIS) environment to evaluate the theoretical hydrokinetic energy potentials of selected Rivers (Asa, Awun and Oyun) all in Asa watershed, Kwara state, Nigeria. SWAT was interfaced with an open source GIS system to predict the flow and other hydrological parameters of the sub-basins. The model was calibrated and validated using observed stream flow data. Calibrated flow results were used in conjunction with other parameters to compute the theoretical hydrokinetic energy potentials of the Rivers. Results showed a good correlation between the observed flow and the simulated flow, indicated by ash Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) and R² of 0.76 and 0.85, respectively for calibration period, and NSE and R² of 0.70 and 0.74, respectively for the validation period. Also, it was observed that highest potential of 154.82 MW was obtained along River Awun while the lowest potential of 41.63 MW was obtained along River Asa. The energy potentials obtained could be harnessed and deployed to the communities around the watershed for their energy needs.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2001.03a
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• pp.577-584
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• 2001

For construction and design of tunnels, groundwater flow models are used to find the influence of groundwater to the stability of tunnels considering the geological condition around the tunnels and the materials used in tunnel linings. For the analysis of tunnel flow, some commercial programs, e.g. MODFLOW, SEEP/W etc., are used. These programs have limitations that MODFLOW could not define curved surface smoothly in three dimensional flow media and SEEP/W is the 2-dimensional flow model. In this paper, the ability of a finite element program developed for analyzing 3-dimensional groundwater flow is examined. Confined steady state groundwater flow solution in non-homogeneous media is obtained using isoparametric element with eight trilinear hexahedron nodes and is compared with the result of MODFLOW. It was found that the solution yielded a good result with the three dimensional flow studied.