Consideration of the dielectric response for radiation chemistry simulations

Toigawa, Tomohiro; Kai, Takeshi; Kumagai, Yuta; Yokoya, Akinari*

Journal of Chemical Physics, 160(21), p.214119_1 - 214119_9, 2024/06

https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0211089

The spur reaction is crucial for determining radiolysis or photolysis in liquid, but the spur expansion process has yet to be elucidated. One reason is the need to understand the role of the dielectric response of the solvating molecules surrounding the charged species generated by ionization. The dielectric response corresponds to the time evolution of the permittivity and might affect the chemical reaction-diffusion of the species in a spur expansion process. This study examined the competitive relationship between reaction-diffusion kinetics and the dielectric response by solving the Debye-Smoluchowski equation while considering the dielectric response. The Coulomb force between the charged species gradually decreases with the dielectric response. Our calculation results found a condition where fast recombination occurs before the dielectric response is complete. Although it has been reported that the primary G-values of free electrons depend on the static dielectric constant under low-linear-energy transfer radiation-induced ionization, we propose that considering the dielectric response can provide a deeper insight into fast recombination reactions under high-linear-energy transfer radiation- or photo-induced ionization. Our simulation method enables the understanding of fast radiation-induced phenomena in liquids.

Cavitation damage prediction in mercury target for pulsed spallation neutron source using Monte Carlo simulation

Wakui, Takashi; Takagishi, Yoichi*; Futakawa, Masatoshi

Materials, 16(17), p.5830_1 - 5830_16, 2023/09

https://doi.org/10.3390/ma16175830

Cavitation damage on the mercury target vessel is induced by proton beam injection in mercury. The prediction method of the cavitation damage using Monte Carlo simulations was proposed taking into account of the uncertainties of the position of cavitation bubbles and impact pressure distributions. The distribution of impact pressure attributed to individual cavitation bubble collapsing was assumed to be the Gaussian distribution, and the probability distribution of the maximum value of impact pressures was assumed to be three kinds of distributions; the delta function, the Gaussian and Weibull distributions. Two parameters were estimated using Bayesian optimization by comparing the distribution of the cavitation damage obtained from experiment with that of accumulated plastic strain obtained from the simulation. It was found that the results obtained using the Weibull distribution reproduced the actual cavitation erosion phenomenon better than the other results.

Dynamic probabilistic risk assessment of seismic-induced flooding in pressurized water reactor by seismic, flooding, and thermal-hydraulics simulations

Kubo, Kotaro; Jang, S.*; Takata, Takashi*; Yamaguchi, Akira*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 60(4), p.359 - 373, 2023/04

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2022.2100837

Probabilistic risk assessment (PRA) is an essential approach to improving the safety of nuclear power plants. However, this method includes certain difficulties, such as modeling of combinations of multiple hazards. Seismic-induced flooding scenario includes several core damage sequences, i.e., core damage caused by earthquake, flooding, and combination of earthquake and flooding. The flooding fragility is time-dependent as the flooding water propagates from the water source such as a tank to compartments. Therefore, dynamic PRA should be used to perform a realistic risk analysis and quantification. This study analyzed the risk of seismic-induced flooding events by coupling seismic, flooding, and thermal-hydraulics simulations, considering the dependency between multiple hazards explicitly. For requirements of safety improvement, especially in light of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident, sensitivity analysis was performed on the seismic capacity of systems, and the effectiveness of alternative steam generator injection by a portable pump was estimated. We demonstrate the use of this simulation-based dynamic PRA methodology to evaluate the risk induced by a combination of hazards.

Calculating off-axis efficiency of coaxial HPGe detectors by Monte Carlo simulation

Omer, M.; Shizuma, Toshiyuki*; Hajima, Ryoichi*; Koizumi, Mitsuo

Radiation Physics and Chemistry, 198, p.110241_1 - 110241_7, 2022/09

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.radphyschem.2022.110241

Medical application of Particle and Heavy Ion Transport code System PHITS

Furuta, Takuya; Sato, Tatsuhiko

Radiological Physics and Technology, 14(3), p.215 - 225, 2021/09

https://doi.org/10.1007/s12194-021-00628-0

Number of the PHITS users has steadily increased since 2010 from when it is officially counted. Among them, increase of new users in medical physics is outstanding. Many research works in medical physics using PHITS have been published and the applications are widely spread in different fields such as applications to different types of radiotherapy, shielding calculations of medical facilities, application to radiation biology, and research and development of medical tools. In this article, we will introduce useful functions for medical application in PHITS by referring to examples of various medical applications.

Simulation analysis of the Compton-to-peak method for quantifying radiocesium deposition quantities

Malins, A.; Ochi, Kotaro; Machida, Masahiko; Sanada, Yukihisa

Proceedings of Joint International Conference on Supercomputing in Nuclear Applications + Monte Carlo 2020 (SNA + MC 2020), p.147 - 154, 2020/10

Monte Carlo radiation transport modelling of the current-biased kinetic inductance detector

Malins, A.; Machida, Masahiko; Vu, TheDang; Aizawa, Kazuya; Ishida, Takekazu*

Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A, 953, p.163130_1 - 163130_7, 2020/02

AA2019-0261.pdf:0.84MB

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2019.163130

Dosimetric dependence of ocular structures on eye size and shape for external radiation fields of electrons, photons, and neutrons

Furuta, Takuya; El Basha, D.*; Iyer, S. S. R.*; Correa Alfonso, C. M.*; Bolch, W. E.*

Journal of Radiological Protection, 39(3), p.825 - 837, 2019/09

https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6498/ab2bcb

Despite large variation of human eye, only one computational eye model has been adopted in almost all the radiation transport simulation studies. We thus adopted a new scalable and deformable eye model and studied the radiation exposure by electrons, photons, and neutrons in the standard radiation fields such as AP, PA, RLAT, ROT, by using Monte Carlo radiation transport code PHITS. We computed the radiation exposure for 5 eye models (standard, large, small, myopic, hyperopic) and analyzed influence of absorbed dose in ocular structures on eye size and shape. Dose distribution of electrons is conformal and therefore the absorbed doses in ocular structures depend on the depth location of each ocular structure. We thus found a significant variation of the absorbed doses for each ocular structure for electron exposure due to change of the depth location affected by eye size and shape. On the other hand only small variation was observed for photons and neutrons exposures because of less conformal dose distribution of those particles.

Overview of computational frog models

Kinase, Sakae; Mohammadi, A.*; Gmez-Ros, J.-M.*

Computational Anatomical Animal Models; Methodological Developments and Research Applications, p.5_1 - 5_9, 2018/12

https://doi.org/10.1088/2053-2563/aae1b4ch5

A Scalable and deformable stylized model of the adult human eye for radiation dose assessment

El Basha, D.*; Furuta, Takuya; Iyer, S. S. R.*; Bolch, W. E.*

Physics in Medicine & Biology, 63(10), p.105017_1 - 105017_13, 2018/05

https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6560/aab955

With recent changes in the recommended annual limit on eye lens exposures to ionizing radiation by International Commission on Radiological Protection, there is considerable interest in predictive computational dosimetry models of the human eye and its various ocular structures. Several computational eye models to date have been constructed for this purpose but they are typically constructed of nominal size and of a roughly spherical shape associated with the emmetropic eye. We therefore constructed a geometric eye model that is both scalable (allowing for changes in eye size) and deformable (allowing for changes in eye shape), and that is suitable for use in radiation transport studies of ocular exposures and radiation treatments of eye disease. As an example, electron and photon anterior-posterior radiation transport with the constructed eye model was conducted and analyzed resultant energy-dependent dose profiles. Due to anterior-posterior irradiation, the energy dose response was shifted to higher energy for a larger-size eye or an axially deformed eye in prolate shape because the structures were located in deeper depth compared to the normal eye.