• 에너지공학
• /
• 제16권4호
• /
• pp.155-163
• /
• 2007

원자로의 안전성 확보를 위해 재장전 기간 동안 수행되는 노물리 시험에서 제어봉의 반응도가(reactivity worth) 산출을 위해 노심의 임계도를 측정해야 하고, 기동운전 시에도 반응도 사고를 대비하여 미임계도가 감시되어야 한다. 미임계도나 제어봉가 측정을 위한 연구가 국내외적으로 지속되어 왔으며, 최근에는 일본에서 "개선된 중성자 선원 증배법(Modified Neutron Source Multiplication Method, MNSM)"이 제안되어 기존의 중성자 선원 증배법의 한계를 극복하였다. 본 연구에서는 MNSM을 경희대 교육용원자로 AGN-201에 적용하여 미임계도를 계산하고 새로운 방법의 타당성을 평가하였다. MNSM의 적용을 위해 AGN-201 원자로에 적합한 핵자료집과 중성자수송 전산코드인 TRANSX - PARTISN 체계를 구축하였고, 유효증배계수와 중성자속(flux) 분포, 수반 중성자속(adjoint flux) 분포 등을 계산하여 제어봉위치에 따른 보정인자들을 산출하였다. 원자로의 미임계도 측정값은 $BF_3$ 비례계수관으로 측정한 중성자계수율을 사용하여 확보하였다. 연구 결과로서 MNSM을 사용하여 평가한 미임계도가 전산코드로 계산하여 얻어진 이론적인 미임계도 값에 근접하고 계산된 보정인자도 유효함을 확인하였다.

• Archives of Plastic Surgery
• /
• 제39권4호
• /
• pp.390-396
• /
• 2012

Background The radial forearm osteocutaneous free flap is considered to be the standard technique for penile construction. One year after their operation, most patients experience a softened phallus, so that they suffer from difficulties in sexual intercourse. In this report, we present our experience with phalloplasty by radial forearm osteocutaneous free flap, as well as an evaluation of the etiology and treatment of the softened phallus. Methods Between March 2005 and February 2010, 58 patients underwent phalloplasty by radial forearm osteocutaneous free flap. Most of their neophallus had been softened subjectively and among them, 12 patients who wanted correction were investigated. We performed repetitive fat injection, artificial dermis grafting, silicone rod insertion, and rib bone with cartilaginous tip graft. Physical examination, plain radiograph, computed tomography, bone scintigraphy, and satisfaction scores were investigated. Results Most of the participants' penises have been softened after phalloplasty, and the skin elasticity had been also decreased. On plain radiograph, the distal end of the bone was self-rounded; however, the bone shape of the neophallus had no significant interval changes or resorption. Computed tomography showed equivocal density of cortical bone. On bone scintigraphy, the bone metabolism was active at 3 months postoperatively, and remained active 9 years postoperatively. Conclusions The use of a rib bone with cartilaginous tip graft could be an option for improvement of the softened phallus. Silicon rod insertion is also worth considering for rigidity of the softened phallus. Decreased rigidity due to soft tissue atrophy could be alleviated with repeated fat injection and artificial dermis grafting.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제53권9호
• /
• pp.2788-2802
• /
• 2021

Multigroup cross section (MG XS) generation by the UNIST in-house Monte Carlo (MC) code MCS for fast reactor analysis using nodal diffusion codes is reported. The feasibility of the approach is quantified for two sodium fast reactors (SFRs) specified in the OECD/NEA SFR benchmark: a 1000 MW_th metal-fueled SFR (MET-1000) and a 3600 MW_th oxide-fueled SFR (MOX-3600). The accuracy of a few-group XSs generated by MCS is verified using another MC code, Serpent 2. The neutronic steady-state whole-core problem is analyzed using MCS/RAST-K with a 24-group XS set. Various core parameters of interest (core k_eff, power profiles, and reactivity feedback coefficients) are obtained using both MCS/RAST-K and MCS. A code-to-code comparison indicates excellent agreement between the nodal diffusion solution and stochastic solution; the error in the core k_eff is less than 110 pcm, the root-mean-square error of the power profiles is within 1.0%, and the error of the reactivity feedback coefficients is within three standard deviations. Furthermore, using the super-homogenization-corrected XSs improves the prediction accuracy of the control rod worth and power profiles with all rods in. Therefore, the results demonstrate that employing the MCS MG XSs for the nodal diffusion code is feasible for high-fidelity analyses of fast reactors.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제54권2호
• /
• pp.764-769
• /
• 2022

The United Arab Emirates is currently building and operating four units of the APR-1400 developed by a South Korean vendor, Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO). This paper attempts to perform APR-1400 reactor core analysis by using the well-known two-step method. The two-step method was applied to the APR-1400 first cycle using the open-source nodal diffusion code, KOMODO. In this study, the group constants were generated using CASMO-4 fuel transport lattice code. The simulation was performed in Hot Zero Power (HZP) at steady-state and transient conditions. Some typical parameters necessary for the Nuclear Design Report (NDR) were evaluated in this paper, such as effective neutron multiplication factor, control rod worth, and critical boron concentration for steady-state analysis. Other parameters such as reactivity insertion, power, and fuel temperature changes during the Reactivity Insertion Accident (RIA) simulation were evaluated as well. The results from KOMODO were verified using PARCS and SIMULATE-3 nodal core simulators. It was found that KOMODO gives an excellent agreement.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제54권10호
• /
• pp.3888-3896
• /
• 2022

Nuclear data is the basis of reactor physics analysis. This paper aim at studying the influence of major evaluated nuclear data libraries, CENDL-3.2, ENDF/B-VIII.0, JEFF-3.3, and JENDL-4.0u, on the neutronics modelling of CEFR start-up tests. Results show these four libraries have a good performance and consistency in the modelling CEFR start-up tests. The JEFF-3.3 results exhibit only an 8 pcm k_eff difference with the measurement. The difference in criticality is decomposed by nuclide, which shows the large overestimation of CENDL-3.2 is mainly from the cross-section of ⁵²Cr. Except for few cases, the calculation results are within 1σ of measurement uncertainty in control rod worth, sodium void reactivity, temperature reactivity, and subassembly swap reactivity. In the evaluation of axial and radial reaction distribution, there are about 65% of relative errors that are less than 5% and 82% of relative errors that are less than 10%.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제54권10호
• /
• pp.3897-3908
• /
• 2022

High-fidelity nuclear data libraries and neutronics simulation tools are essential for the development of fast reactors. The IAEA coordinated research project on "Neutronics Benchmark of CEFR Start-Up Tests" offers valuable data for the qualification of nuclear data libraries and neutronics codes. This paper focuses on the verification and validation of the CEFR start-up modelling using OpenMC Monte-Carlo code against the experimental measurements. The OpenMC simulation results agree well with the measurements in criticality, control rod worth, sodium void reactivity, temperature reactivity, subassembly swap reactivity, and reaction distribution. In feedback coefficient evaluations, an additional state method shows high consistency with lower uncertainty. Among 122 relative errors in the benchmark of the distribution of nuclear reaction, 104 errors are less than 10% and 84 errors are less than 5%. The results demonstrate the high reliability of OpenMC for its application in fast reactor simulations. In the companion paper, the influence of cross-section libraries is investigated using neutronics modelling in this paper.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제25권3호
• /
• pp.361-370
• /
• 1993

국내 가압 경수로는 핵연료 재장전후 해당 주기 노심핵설계의 타당성 및 안선 제한치의 만족 여부를 확인하기 위하여 저출력에서 노물리 시험을 수행한다. 그러나 고리 3호기 7주기를 포함한 일부 저출력 노물리 시험 중 step 반응도를 삽입한 후에도 반응도가 서서히 증가하는 기이한 현상이 나타났다. 이러한 현상은 시험시 중성자속 준위가 낮고 노외 핵계측기로 비보상형 전리함을 사용하기 때문에 감마 background가 존재하여 생기는 것이다. 이로 인해 노물리 시험 결과는 많은 오차를 포함할 수도 있는 것이다. 본 연구에서는 반응도가 증가하는 현상을 정량적으로 분석하고 기준 제어봉 제어능 측정 시험을 모사함으로써 노물리 시험 결과의 오차를 줄일 수 있는 방법을 제시하고 이후의 노물리 시험에 적용하여 확인하였다. 또한 감마 background 준위를 산정한 후 중성자속 준위를 조정하여 기준 제어봉 제어능 측정 시험을 통해 감마 background의 영향을 받지 않는 중성자속 준위를 결정하였다. 결정된 중성자속 준위는 핵가열이 발생하는 중성자속의 3/10이다. 이것은 기존의 상한치보다 3배 증가된 것이다. 이 결과는 고리 4호기 7주기 및 영광 1호기 7주기 노물리 시험에 성공적으로 적용되었다.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제55권4호
• /
• pp.1563-1570
• /
• 2023

In this study, a DeCART/MIG uncertainty quantification (UQ) analysis code system with a multicorrelated cross section stochastic sampling (S.S.) module was established and verified through the UAM (Uncertainty Analysis in Modeling) and the BEAVRS (Benchmark for Evaluation And Validation of Reactor Simulations) benchmark calculations. For the S.S. calculations, a sample of 500 DeCART multigroup cross section sets for two major actinides, i.e., ²³⁵U and ²³⁸U, were generated by the MIG code and covariance data from the ENDF/B-VII.1 evaluated nuclear data library. In the three pin problems (i.e. TMI-1, PB2, and Koz-6) from the UAM benchmark, the uncertainties in k_inf by the DeCART/MIG S.S. calculations agreed very well with the sensitivity and uncertainty (S/U) perturbation results by DeCART/MUSAD and the S/U direct subtraction (S/U-DS) results by the DeCART/MIG. From these results, it was concluded that the multi-group cross section sampling module of the MIG code works correctly and accurately. In the BEAVRS whole benchmark problems, the uncertainties in the control rod bank worth, isothermal temperature coefficient, power distribution, and critical boron concentration due to cross section uncertainties were calculated by the DeCART/MIG code system. Overall, the uncertainties in these design parameters were less than the general design review criteria of a typical pressurized water reactor start-up case. This newly-developed DeCART/MIG UQ analysis code system by the S.S. method can be widely utilized as uncertainty analysis and margin estimation tools for developing and designing new advanced nuclear reactors.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• 제55권6호
• /
• pp.2112-2124
• /
• 2023

With the rise of economic and safety standards for nuclear reactors, new concepts of Gen-IV reactors and modular reactors showed more complex designs that challenge current tools for reactor physics analysis. A Monte Carlo (MC) two-step method was proposed in this work. This calculation scheme uses the continuous-energy MC method to generate multi-group cross-sections from heterogeneous models. The multi-group MC method, which can adapt locally-heterogeneous models, is used in the core calculation step. This calculation scheme is verified using a Gen-IV modular lead-based fast reactor (LFR) benchmark case. The influence of homogenized patterns, scatter approximations, flux separable approximation, and local heterogeneity in core calculation on simulation results are investigated. Results showed that the cross-sections generated using the 3D assembly model with a locally heterogeneous representation of control rods lead to an accurate estimation with less than 270 pcm bias in core reactivity, 0.5% bias in control rod worth, and 1.5% bias on power distribution. The study verified the applicability of multi-group cross-sections generated with the MC method for LFR analysis. The study also proved the feasibility of multi-group MC in core calculation with local heterogeneity, which saves 85% time compared to the continuous-energy MC.

• 에너지공학
• /
• 제13권4호
• /
• pp.242-258
• /
• 2004

한국원자력연구소에서는 기존의 일체형 가연성 독봉과 다른 이중구조로 된 가연성독봉 개념을 제시하였다. 이중구조 가연성독봉(Erbia Duplex BP)은 내부에 Natural U+Gd$_2$O$_3$, 외부에는 Enriched $UO_2$+Er$_2$O$_3$를 배열시킨 구조이다. 이러한 독봉은 장주기 노심에서 기존의 Gadolinia BP과 동일한 반응도제어를 할 수 있을 것이라 예상된다. 이중구조 가연성독봉의 핵적 타당성을 확인하기 위해 24개월 주기용 한국표준형원자로를 비교대상으로 선정하였으며, 기존 연구된 여러 가지 독봉설계안들과 4가지 핵특성에 대하여 비교 분석하였다. 핵특성 평가 결과, 이중구조가연성 독봉은 비교대상보다 무한증배계수, 첨두봉출력인자, 반응도억제가, 감속재온도계수측면에서 모두 유리한 경향을 보였다. 설계변수에 따른 민감도분석을 통해 도출한 최적화된 핵연료집합체를 이용하여 노심적용 타당성을 확인하였다. 주기길이, 첨두출력 및 감속재온도 계수를 비교하였으며 전 노심해석결과 주기길이가 비고대상보다 4-7일 길게 나타났다. 이러한 결과는 등가의 독봉집합체를 설계했음에도 불구하고 노심에 장전되는 우라늄의 양이 서로 달라서 생기는 현상으로 판단된다. 하지만 전체적인 핵특성을 비교해보면 이중구조 가연성독봉을 장전한 노심이 비교대상노심보다 다소 유리하면서도 거의 비슷함을 알 수 있었다. 마지막으로 경제성 평가를 통해 장주기 노심에서의 이중구조 가연성독봉의 제조 가능성 및 적용 타당성이 충분히 확인되었다.