• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.8
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• pp.2935-2940
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• 2023

A polystyrene phantom was developed following the guidance of the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) for gamma knife (GK) quality assurance. Its performance was assessed by measuring the absorbed dose rate to water and dose distributions. The phantom was made of polystyrene, which has an electron density (1.0156) similar to that of water. The phantom included one outer phantom and four inner phantoms. Two inner phantoms held PTW T31010 and Exradin A16 ion chambers. One inner phantom held a film in the XY plane of the Leksell coordinate system, and another inner phantom held a film in the YZ or ZX planes. The absorbed dose rate to water and beam profiles of the machine-specific reference (msr) field, namely, the 16 mm collimator field of a GK Perfexion^TM or Icon^TM, were measured at seven GK sites. The measured results were compared to those of an IAEA-recommended solid water (SW) phantom. The radius of the polystyrene phantom was determined to be 7.88 cm by converting the electron density of the plastic, considering a water depth of 8 g/cm². The absorbed dose rates to water measured in both phantoms differed from the treatment planning program by less than 1.1%. Before msr correction, the PTW T31010 dose rates (PTW Freiberg GmbH, New York, NY, USA) in the polystyrene phantom were 0.70 (0.29)% higher on average than those in the SW phantom. The Exradin A16 (Standard Imaging, Middleton, WI, USA) dose rates were 0.76 (0.32)% higher in the polystyrene phantom. After msr correction factors were applied, there were no statistically significant differences in the A16 dose rates measured in the two phantoms; however, the T31010 dose rates were 0.72 (0.29)% higher in the polystyrene phantom. When the full widths at half maximum and penumbras of the msr field were compared, no significant differences between the two phantoms were observed, except for the penumbra in the Y-axis. However, the difference in the penumbra was smaller than variations among different sites. A polystyrene phantom developed for gamma knife dosimetry showed dosimetric performance comparable to that of a commercial SW phantom. In addition to its cost effectiveness, the polystyrene phantom removes air space around the detector. Additional simulations of the msr correction factors of the polystyrene phantom should be performed.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.101-107
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• 1990

The PIXE (Proton Induced X-ray Emission) method is applied to the quantitative analysis of trace elements in tap water, red wine, urine and old black powder samples. Sample irradiations are performed with a 1.202 MeV proton beam from the SNU 1.5-MV Tandem Van de Graaff accelerator, and measurements of X-ray spectra are made by the Si(Li) spectrometer To increase the sensitivity of analysis tap water is preconcentrated by evaporation method. As an internal standard, Ni powder is mixed with black powder sample and yttrium solution is added to the other samples. The analyses of the PIXE spectra are carried out by using the AXIL (Analytical X-ray Analysis by Iterative Least-squares) computer code, in which the routine for least-squares method is based on the Marquardt algorithm. The elements such as Mg, Al, Si, Ti, Fe and Zn are analyzed at sub-ppm levels in the tap water sample. In the red wine sample prepared without preconcentration. the element Ti is detected in the amount of 3ppm. In conclusion, the PIXE method is proved to be appropriate for the analysis of liquid samples by relative measurements using the internal standard. and is expected to be improved by the use of evaluated X-ray production cross-sections and the development of sample preparation techniques.

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2004.02a
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• pp.150-164
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• 2004

According to the Korean long-term plan for nuclear technology development, KAERI is conducting a few R&D projects related to the proliferation-resistant back-end fuel cycle. The R&D activities for the back-end fuel cycle are reviewed in this work, especially focusing on the study of the partitioning and transmutation(P&T) of long-lived radionuclides. The P&T study is currently being carried out in order to develop key technologies in the areas of partitioning and transmutation. The partitioning study is based on the development of pyroprocessing such as electrorefining and electrowinning because they can be adopted as proliferation-resistant technologies in the fuel cycle. In this study, various behaviors of the electrodeposition of uranium and rare earth elements in the LiCl-KCl electrorefining system have been examined through fundamental experimental work. As for the transmutation system, KAERI is studying the HYPER (HYbrid Power Extraction Reactor), a kind of subcritical reactor which will be connected with a proton accelerator. Up to now, a conceptual study has been carried out for the major elemental systems of the subcritical reactor such as core, transuranic fuel, long-lived fission product target, and the Pb-Bi cooling system, etc. In order to enhance the transmutation efficiency of the transuranic elements as well as to strengthen the reactor safety, the reactor core was optimized by determining its most suitable subcriticality, the ratio of height/diameter, and by introducing the concepts of optimum core configuration with a transuranic enrichment as well as a scattered reloading of the fuel assemblies.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.87-93
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• 2010

RS(10,8) Code by 4-bit symbol was developed to protect the mass memory of STSAT-3 from SEU in orbit. Therefore, one symbol can be corrected for 32-bit data with 8-bit parity configuration. Moreover, scrubbing period and SEU occurrence rate was calculated based on the KITSAT-3 result. A prediction of SEU rates was performed based on the ground experiment results with a proton accelerator in the KIRAMS(Korea Institute of Radiological Medical Sciences).

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.48 no.2
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• pp.360-367
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• 2016

A windowless spallation target can provide a neutron source and maintain neutron chain reaction for a subcritical reactor, and is a key component of China's nuclear waste transmutation of coupling accelerator and subcritical reactor. The main issue of the windowless target design is to form a stable and controllable free surface that can ensure that energy spectrum distribution is acquired for the neutron physical design when the high energy proton beam beats the lead-bismuth eutectic in the spallation target area. In this study, morphology and flow characteristics of the free surface of the windowless target were analyzed through the volume of fluid model using computational fluid dynamics simulation, and the results show that the outlet cross section size of the target is the key to form a stable and controllable free surface, as well as the outlet with an arc transition. The optimization parameter of the target design, in which the radius of outlet cross section is $60{\pm}1mm$, is verified to form a stable and controllable free surface and to reduce the formation of air bubbles. This work can function as a reference for carrying out engineering design of windowless target and for verification experiments.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.11
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• pp.4310-4321
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• 2022

The concept of dense granular-flow target (DGT) for the China Initiative Accelerator Driven Subcritical system (CiADS) is an attractive choice for high heat removal ability, low chemical toxicity, and radiotoxicity. A wobbling hollow beam is proposed to enhance the homogeneity of temperature rise of flowing particles in beam-target coupling zone. In this paper, the design procedure of target and beam parameters was discussed firstly. Then we simulated the heat deposition and transfer of the scanning beam in DGT to study the effect of beam parameters. The results show the flux density of proton beam plays a crucial role in the distribution of temperature rise while the contributions from scanning frequency heat transfer are also obvious. Moreover, heat transfer in transversal directions is insignificant, resulting in a low heat flux towards the sidewalls of DGT. This work not only contributes to the design of DGT, but also beneficial for understanding the beam-target coupling in porous materials.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.10
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• pp.3768-3774
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• 2023

The purpose of the target system for the muon spin rotation, relaxation, and resonance (µSR) facility at the Rare isotope Accelerator complex for ON-line experiments (RAON) is to induce the production of a significant number of surface muons in thermally stable experiments. The manufactured target system was installed at RAON in the Sindong area near Daejeon in 2021. The design was made conservatively with a sufficient margin of safety through ANSYS calculations; however, verification experiments had to be performed on the ANSYS calculations. Because the 600-MeV proton beam has not yet been provided, an alternative way to reproduce the calculation conditions was required. The radio frequency (RF) heating method, which has not yet been applied to the target verification experiment but has several advantages, was used. It was observed that the RF heating method has promise for testing the thermal stability of the target, and whether the target system design process was performed conservatively enough was verified by comparing the RF heating experiments with the ANSYS calculations.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.59-63
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• 2011

It is important to reduce indirect scattered neutron beside direct neutron of chosen energy for designing a neutron-reference-field laboratory with neutron produced from a nuclear reaction by a accelerator. Therefore MCNPX simulation was performed with various conditions for obtaining such condition. At first in the original laboratory condition we calculated the direct neutron flux which was inserted in chamber (virtual chamber composed of air) of 0 degree (proton moving direction) for neutron flux measurement and the scattered neutron flux which is inserted in the chamber after scattering wall or bottom. In the result, the scattered neutron which was inserted after scattering bottom is more than that which was inserted after scattering the others. Therefore MCNPX simulation was again performed with removing the concrete bottom and with removing the concrete bottom and digging 1 m in the ground. In the result of removing concrete bottom and digging 1 m in the ground, scattered neutron which was inserted after scattering bottom became less than that which was inserted after scattering the others.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Medical Physics Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.157-160
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• 2002

The dosage of intra-operative BNCT using near-threshold $^{7}$ Li(p,n)$^{7}$ Be direct neutrons was evaluated with the calculation method validated with the phantom experiment. The production of both neutrons by near-threshold $^{7}$ Li(p,n)$^{7}$ Be and gamma rays by $^{7}$ Li(p,p'gamma)$^{7}$ Li in a Li target was calculated using Lee's method and their transport in the phantom was calculated with MCNP-4B. As a result, the region satisfying the requirements of the protocol in intra-operative BNCT for brain tumors in Japan was acknowledged to be comparable to present BNCT, for the proton energy of 1.900 MeV for example. A boron-dose enhancer (BDE) introduced in this study to increase $^{10}$ (n,$\alpha$)$^{7}$ Li dose in a living body was effective. The void used to increase doses in deep regions was also valid with the BDE. It was found that intra-operative BNCT using near-threshold $^{7}$ Li(p,n)$^{7}$ Be direct neutrons is feasible.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Medical Physics Conference
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.267-268
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• 2002

Microbeam is a new avenue of radiation research especially in radiation biology and radiation protection. Selective irradiation of an ionizing particle to a targeted cell organelle may disclose such mechanisms as signal transaction among cell organelles and cell-to-cell communication in the processes toward an endpoint observed. Bystander effect, existence of which is clearly evidenced by application of the particle microbeam to biological experiments, suggests potential underestimation in the conventional risk estimation at low particle fluence rates, such as environment of space radiations in ISS (International Space Station). To promote these studies we started the construction of our microbeam facility (named as SPICE) to our HVEE Tandem accelerator (3.4 MeV proton and 5.1 MeV $^4$He$\^$2+/). For our primary goal, "irradiation of single particle to cell organelle within a position resolution of 2 micrometer in a reasonable irradiation time", special features are considered. Usage of a triplet Q magnet for focussing the beam to submicron of size is an outstanding feature compared to facilities of other institutes. Followings are other features: precise position control of cell dish holder, design of the cell dish, data acquisition of microscopic image of a cell organelle (cell nucleus) and data processing, a reliable particle detection, soft and hard wares to integrate all these related data, to control and irradiate exactly determined number of particles to a targeted spot.