High Temperature Gas-cooled Reactor (HTGR)

Noguchi, Hiroki; Sato, Hiroyuki; Nishihara, Tetsuo; Sakaba, Nariaki

Kagaku Kogaku, 88(5), p.211 - 214, 2024/05

High temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR), one of the next-generation innovative reactors, has an inherent safety and can generate very high-temperature heat which can be used for various heat application including hydrogen production. In Japan, Green Growth Strategy for Carbon Neutrality in 2050 and Basic Policy for the Realization of GX state the promotion of technology development necessary for mass and low-cost carbon-free hydrogen production and development and construction of next-generation innovative reactors including the HTGR for the decarbonization of industrial sectors. Based on these policies, JAEA has been conducted the world's first hydrogen production test using nuclear heat from an HTGR, in addition to verifying the excellent safety features of HTGR, and has also started to study the construction of an HTGR demonstration reactor in cooperation with the industrial community. This paper shows the current status of R&D of HTGR in Japan.

Production rates of long-lived radionuclides Be and Al under direct muon-induced spallation in granite quartz and its implications for past high-energy cosmic ray fluxes

Sakurai, Hirohisa*; Kurebayashi, Yutaka*; Suzuki, Soichiro*; Horiuchi, Kazuho*; Takahashi, Yui*; Doshita, Norihiro*; Kikuchi, Satoshi*; Tokanai, Fuyuki*; Iwata, Naoyoshi*; Tajima, Yasushi*; et al.

Physical Review D, 109(10), p.102005_1 - 102005_18, 2024/05

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.109.102005

Secular variations of galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) are inseparably associated with the galactic activities and should reflect the environments of the local galactic magnetic field, interstellar clouds, and nearby supernova remnants. The high-energy muons produced in the atmosphere by high-energy GCRs can penetrate deep underground and generate radioisotopes in the rock. As long lived radionuclides such as Be and Al have been accumulating in these rocks, concentrations of Be and Al can be used to estimate the long-term variations in high-energy muon yields, corresponding to those in the high-energy GCRs over a few million years. This study measured the production cross sections for muon induced Be and Al by irradiating positive muons with the momentum of 160 GeV/c on the synthetic silica plates and the granite core at the COMPASS experiment line in CERN SPS. In addition, it the contributions of the direct muon spallation reaction and the nuclear reactions by muon-induced particles on the production of long lived radionuclides in the rocks were clarified.

Annual report on the environmental radiation monitoring around the Tokai Reprocessing Plant FY2022

Kokubun, Yuji; Nakada, Akira; Seya, Natsumi; Koike, Yuko; Nemoto, Masashi; Tobita, Keiji; Yamada, Ryohei*; Uchiyama, Rei; Yamashita, Daichi; Nagai, Shinji; et al.

JAEA-Review 2023-046, 164 Pages, 2024/03

JAEA-Review-2023-046.pdf:4.2MB

The Nuclear Fuel Cycle Engineering Laboratories conducts environmental radiation monitoring around the reprocessing plant in accordance with the "Safety Regulations for Reprocessing Plant of JAEA, Part IV: Environmental Monitoring". This report summarizes the results of environmental radiation monitoring conducted during the period from April 2022 to March 2023 and the results of dose calculations for the surrounding public due to the release of radioactive materials into the atmosphere and ocean. In the results of the above environmental radiation monitoring, many items were affected by radioactive materials emitted from the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant of Tokyo Electric Power Company, Incorporated (changed to Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. on April 1, 2016), which occurred in March 2011. Also included as appendices are an overview of the environmental monitoring plan, an overview of measurement methods, measurement results and their changes over time, meteorological statistics results, radioactive waste release status, and an evaluation of the data which deviated of the normal range.

Changes in molecular conformation and electronic structure of DNA under C ions based on first-principles calculations

Sekikawa, Takuya; Matsuya, Yusuke; Hwang, B.*; Ishizaka, Masato*; Kawai, Hiroyuki*; Ono, Yoshiaki*; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Kai, Takeshi

Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research B, 548, p.165231_1 - 165231_6, 2024/03

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nimb.2023.165231

One of the main causes of radiation effects on the human body is thought to be damage to DNA, which carries genetic information. However, it is not fully understood what kind of molecular structural changes DNA undergoes upon radiation damage. Since it has been reported that various types of DNA damage are formed when DNA is irradiated, our group has investigated the relationship between DNA damage and various patterns of radiation-induced ionization induced by radiation. Although we have so far analyzed DNA damage in a simple system using a rigid body model of DNA, more detailed calculations are required to analyze the molecular structural changes in DNA, which are considered to be important in considering the effects on the human body. In this study, we attempted to clarify the molecular conformational changes of DNA using OpenMX, a first-principles calculation software that can discuss electronic states based on molecular structures. Specifically, we calculated the most stable structure, band dispersion, and wave function of DNA under the assumption that one and two electrons are ionized by various radiation. In the presentation, we will discuss the relationship between the energy dependence of each incident radiation type and the molecular conformational change of DNA. In addition, the radiation-induced changes in the basic physical properties of DNA (corresponding to the initial stage of DNA damage) will be discussed from the viewpoints of both radiation physics and solid state physics.

Development of failure mitigation technologies for improving resilience of nuclear structures, 1; Failure mitigation by passive safety structures without catastrophic failure

Kasahara, Naoto*; Yamano, Hidemasa; Nakamura, Izumi*; Demachi, Kazuyuki*; Sato, Takuya*; Ichimiya, Masakazu*

Transactions of the 27th International Conference on Structural Mechanics in Reactor Technology (SMiRT 27) (Internet), 8 Pages, 2024/03

In this study, we propose failure mitigation methods by application of passive safety structures. The idea of the passive safety structures was applied to next generation fast reactors under high temperature conditions and excessive earthquake conditions.

Development of contamination detection system combined with various remote devices

Morishita, Yuki; Miyamura, Hiroko; Sato, Yuki; Oura, Masatoshi*

Radiation Measurements, 171, p.107064_1 - 107064_7, 2024/02

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radmeas.2024.107064

The detection of alpha and beta contamination locations is important for decontaminating nuclear facilities. In the high radiation dose rate environment at the decommissioning sites, the contamination measurement by the workers is not effective. Thus, we developed a remote automatic contamination measurement system using a new scintillator-based detector. A 50 mm 100-m-thick YAlO(Ce)(YAP:Ce) scintillator was coupled with a flat panel-type multianode photomultiplier tube. The detector was installed downwards at the bottom of a robot. It has an energy measurement capability, and the energy measurement could discriminate the alpha particles from the beta and Rn alpha particles. With the energy information, alpha and beta particles could be identified and mapped simultaneously. In addition, a slow-moving robot could be used to obtain statistically sufficient counts in a single run measurement, allowing the evaluation of surface contamination density using only alpha particles. The remote automatic contamination measurement system will be useful in visualizing the contamination distribution in environments that are inaccessible to workers.

Measurement of the neutron capture cross section of Re in the keV energy region

Katabuchi, Tatsuya*; Sato, Yaoki*; Takebe, Karin*; Igashira, Masayuki*; Umezawa, Seigo*; Fujioka, Ryo*; Saito, Tatsuhiro*; Iwamoto, Nobuyuki

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 6 Pages, 2024/00

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2023.2298749

Microstructural evolution of intermetallic phase precipitates in Cr-coated zirconium alloy cladding in high-temperature steam oxidation up to 1400C

Mohamad, A. B.; Nemoto, Yoshiyuki; Furumoto, Kenichiro*; Okada, Yuji*; Sato, Daiki*

Corrosion Science, 224, p.111540_1 - 111540_15, 2023/11

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2023.111540

Impact of the Ce states in the electronic structure of the intermediate-valence superconductor CeIr

Fujimori, Shinichi; Kawasaki, Ikuto; Takeda, Yukiharu; Yamagami, Hiroshi; Sasabe, Norimasa*; Sato, Yoshiki*; Shimizu, Yusei*; Nakamura, Ai*; Maruya, A.*; Homma, Yoshiya*; et al.

Electronic Structure (Internet), 5(4), p.045009_1 - 045009_7, 2023/11

https://doi.org/10.1088/2516-1075/ad0a3d

Study on simulation code for transverse instabilities for the J-PARC MR

Yoshimura, Nobuyuki*; Toyama, Takeshi*; Shobuda, Yoshihiro; Nakamura, Takeshi*; Omi, Kazuhito*; Kobayashi, Aine*; Okada, Masashi*; Sato, Yoichi*; Nakaya, Tsuyoshi*

Proceedings of 20th Annual Meeting of Particle Accelerator Society of Japan (Internet), p.260 - 264, 2023/11

https://www.pasj.jp/web_publish/pasj2023/proceedings/PDF/TUP0/TUP03.pdf

The J-PARC main ring (MR) will be increased to 1.3 MW. To cope with the increase in beam intensity, the intra-bunch feedback system (IBFB) needs to be upgraded to handle higher frequencies up to about 200 MHz. To evaluate the performance and understand the optimal parameters after this upgrade, we are developing a particle tracking simulation that includes the necessary components. The recoherence period induced by chromaticity between tracking simulations and experiments are compared and it cannot be discribed by the simple simulations, and we investigate what mechanisms explain this result. The shift of synchrotron tune caused by longitudinal wakes using tracking simulations are calculated and it find that introducing the effect of longitudinal wakes only does not explain the recoherence period in the experimental results.