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[en] The neutron resonance phenomena constitute one of the most fundamental subjects in nuclear physics as well as in reactor physics. It is the area where the concepts of nuclear interaction and the treatment of the neutronic balance in reactor lattices become intertwined. The later requires the detailed knowledge of resonance structures of many nuclide of practical interest to the development of nuclear energy. The key issue of the resonance treatment in reactor applications is directly associated with the use of the microscopic cross sections in the macroscopic reactor cells with a wide range of composition, temperature,and geometric configurations. It gives rise to the so called self-shielding effect. The accurate estimations of such a effect is essential not only in the calculation of the criticality of a reactor but also from the point of view of safety considerations. The latter manifests through the Doppler effect particularly crucial to the fast reactor development. The task of accurate treatment of the self-shielding effect, however, is by no means simple. In fact, it is perhaps the most complicated problem in neutron physics which, strictly speaking, requires the dependence of many physical variables. Two important elements of particular interest are : (1) a concise description of the resonance cross sections as a function of energy and temperature; (2) accurate estimation of the corresponding neutron flux where appropriate. These topics will be discussed from both the historical as well as the state-of-art perspectives

[en] The fundamental basis regarding treatment of unresolved resonances and the construction of probability tables and the relevant issues with their application to reactor physics is critically examined. A theoretical model using integral transform techniques is developed that provides a viable alternative to the stochastic-based 'ladder' method widely used to construct probability tables. A brief review of the statistical theory for treating the unresolved resonances is presented, followed by a critical examination of these methods. Then a reference method for computing various probability distributions at 0 K is derived analytically for Breit-Wigner resonances. This reference model provides the analytical insight and conceptual basis for extension to the general case of arbitrary temperature. The generalization to arbitrary temperature is accomplished using the Chebyshev expansion while maintaining the general forms of the distributions. Results of extensive benchmark calculations to verify the viability of the proposed method are presented. Finally, there is discussion of the remaining challenges in application of this new analytical approach, in particular, the issue of its extension beyond the Breit-Wigner approximation.

[en] Because of the potential importance of the Doppler effect to the safety considerations of compact fast spectrum reactors for space applications, extensive investigations have been carried out. The purpose of this paper is two-fold. First, the magnitude of the Doppler reactivity of such reactors will be estimated. Secondly, some relevant questions concerning the fundamental nature of the problems will be addressed. In the present study, a generic space reactor design having features of current designs is examined. In R-Z geometry, the reactor consists of 3 core regions which are made of UN with various enrichments mixed in with a W/Re matrix and coolant channels filled with ⁷Li and surrounded by Mo-vessel and beryllium oxide reflector along with external control drums made of B₄C in the radial direction and accompanied by axial regions. The axial region above the core contains BeO with W/Re structure. The enrichment increases as a function of radius to provide an approximately constant power distribution in the core regions. Hence, the temperature distribution is also expected to be approximately constant in various core regions. The Doppler reactivities will be given for various radial and axial regions

[en] The two general methods for representing the behavior of the unresolved resonances and the limitations of these methods are discussed. Possible solutions to the problem are considered. 17 references

[en] A simplified version of the rigorous pole representation of cross sections has been developed to facilitate utilization of the newly released ENDF/B VI resonance data based on the Reich-Moore parameters for reactor applications. The procedure is equivalent to the extraction of the Humblet-Rosenfeld-type parameters and the associated 'background' term explicitly from the rigorous pole and residue parameters which, in turn, are converted from a given set of the Reich-Moore parameters. The computational efficiency and its amenability to the existing reactor codes are significantly enhanced by the introduction of the pertinent analytic continuation in place of the smooth 'background' term via the non-linear least square fitting. The method has been successfully applied to all major nuclides examined and the results are presented. 6 refs

[en] The key role of the resonance phenomena in reactor applications manifests through the self-shielding effect. The basic issue involves the application of the microscopic cross sections in the macroscopic reactor lattices consisting of many nuclides that exhibit resonance behavior. To preserve the fidelity of such a effect requires the accurate calculations of the cross sections and the neutron flux in great detail. This clearly not possible without viable resonance data. Recently released ENDF/B VI resonance data in the resolved range especially reflect the dramatic improvement in two important areas; namely, the significant extension of the resolved resonance ranges accompanied by the availability of the R-matrix parameters of the Reich-Moore type. Aside from the obvious increase in computing time required for the significantly greater number of resonances, the main concern is the compatibility of the Riech-Moore representation to the existing reactor processing codes which, until now, are based on the traditional cross section formalisms. This purpose of this paper is to summarize our recent efforts to facilitate implementation of the proposed methods into the production codes at ANL

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