Development of an areal density imaging for boron and other elements

Tsuchikawa, Yusuke; Kai, Tetsuya; Abe, Yuta; Oikawa, Kenichi; Parker, J. D.*; Shinohara, Takenao; Sato, Ikken

Journal of Physics; Conference Series, 2605, p.012022_1 - 012022_6, 2023/10

https://doi.org/10.1088/1742-6596/2605/1/012022

We developed a method to obtain the areal density distribution of boron, which has a large neutron cross section, by means of an energy resolved neutron imaging. Commonly in a measurement of elements with very high neutron sensitivity, the quantitative measurement becomes more difficult with the amount of element due to the neutron self-shielding effect. To avoid this effect, an energy-resolved method using known cross section data was attempted, and a quantitative imaging of such elements was demonstrated at the MLF of J-PARC. This presentation introduces a measurement of melted simulated-fuel assemblies obtained in the research of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant after the severe accident. Energy-dependent neutron transmission rates of the samples were measured by a neutron imaging detector, and were analyzed to obtained the areal density of boron at each position.

Effect of calcium on niobium solubility in alkaline solutions

Ohira, Saki; Abe, Takeyasu; Iida, Yoshihisa

Radiochimica Acta, 111(7), p.525 - 531, 2023/07

https://doi.org/10.1515/ract-2022-0115

The solubility of Nb in calcium alkaline solutions is one of the important parameters in safety assessment of intermediate-depth disposal which are assumed to use cementitious materials. Nb solubility and solubility-limiting solid phases of Nb in these systems remain unclear. The oversaturation solubility experiments were performed systematically in the 0.001-0.1 M CaCl solutions under alkali conditions, and the characterization of precipitated solid phase controlling Nb solubility was conducted. The negative dependence of Nb solubilities on pH and Ca concentration was observed in solubility experiments, the molar ratio of Nb to Ca of precipitated solid phase was 0.66. The pH and Ca dependence of Nb solubilities was reproduced by the reaction with Nb aqueous species Nb(OH) and Ca-Nb oxide with the molar ratio of Nb to Ca 0.66, e.g., CaNbO(am).

Pressure-modulated magnetism and negative thermal expansion in the HoFe intermetallic compound

Cao, Y.*; Zhou, H.*; Khmelevskyi, S.*; Lin, K.*; Avdeev, M.*; Wang, C.-W.*; Wang, B.*; Hu, F.*; Kato, Kenichi*; Hattori, Takanori; et al.

Chemistry of Materials, 35(8), p.3249 - 3255, 2023/04

https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.3c00158

Hydrostatic and chemical pressure are efficient stimuli to alter the crystal structure and are commonly used for tuning electronic and magnetic properties in materials science. However, chemical pressure is difficult to quantify and a clear correspondence between these two types of pressure is still lacking. Here, we study intermetallic candidates for a permanent magnet with a negative thermal expansion (NTE). Based on in situ synchrotron X-ray diffraction, negative chemical pressure is revealed in HoFe on Al doping and quantitatively evaluated by using temperature and pressure dependence of unit cell volume. A combination of magnetization and neutron diffraction measurements also allowed one to compare the effect of chemical pressure on magnetic ordering with that of hydrostatic pressure. Intriguingly, pressure can be used to control suppression and enhancement of NTE. Electronic structure calculations indicate that pressure affected the top of the majority band with respect to the Fermi level, which has implications for the magnetic stability, which in turn plays a critical role in modulating magnetism and NTE. This work presents a good example of understanding the effect of pressure and utilizing it to control properties of functional materials.

Direct disposal concepts of spent mixed oxide fuel from light water reactors based on heat transfer calculations

Abe, Takumi; Nishihara, Kenji

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 13 Pages, 2023/00

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2023.2293106

Methods of direct disposal of mixed oxide spent fuel (MOXSF) consumed in light water reactors were investigated via heat transfer calculation. The temperature of the buffer material surrounding the waste is the most stringent limitation on the direct disposal of MOXSF. Therefore, the effects on the maximum temperature of the buffer material were examined by changing the occupied area, cooling term of MOXSF, and other parameters considering the direct disposal of uranium spent fuel. The results showed that it is necessary to change the cooling term and disposal depth in addition to the change of the occupied area. Accordingly, some disposal concepts that satisfy the limitation of the maximum buffer material temperature were derived, and estimates revealed that the occupied area per unit waste of the MOXSF is three to five times that of uranium spent fuel.

Review of performance assessment for engineered barrier systems to support future RD&D of radioactive waste management in Japan

Abe, Takeyasu; Iida, Yoshihisa

Journal of Advanced Concrete Technology, 20(3), p.236 - 253, 2022/03

https://doi.org/10.3151/jact.20.236

This paper is a state-of-the-art report on the performance assessment of cementitious and related materials as components of engineered barrier systems for radioactive waste management. In this paper, (1) the concept of safety functions is reviewed as the engineering background of discussion, (2) an overview of the postclosure performance assessment for Belgian low- and intermediate-level short-lived radioactive waste disposal is provided, and (3) a modeling methodology for engineered barrier systems is analyzed using the concept of "mandala for durability mechanics". According to these works, authors present technical suggestions for technical stakeholders of Japanese low-level radioactive waste disposal.

Rapid analysis of Sr in cattle bone and tooth samples by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry

Koarai, Kazuma; Matsueda, Makoto; Aoki, Jo; Yanagisawa, Kayo*; Terashima, Motoki; Fujiwara, Kenso; Kino, Yasushi*; Oka, Toshitaka; Takahashi, Atsushi*; Suzuki, Toshihiko*; et al.

Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry, 36(8), p.1678 - 1682, 2021/08

https://doi.org/10.1039/D1JA00086A

Rapid analysis of Sr in bone and tooth samples of cattle were achieved by an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) coupled with mass shift and solid phase extraction techniques. Limit of detection (LOD) in the ICP-MS measurement of 0.1 g samples was lower than that of the radioactivity measurement. Analytical time of the ICP-MS method was reduced from 20 days to 11 hours, compared with the radiometric method. Therefore, the ICP-MS method can be rapid and useful procedure of Sr in small bone and tooth samples derived from terrestrial animals.

Online solid-phase extraction-inductively coupled plasma-quadrupole mass spectrometry with oxygen dynamic reaction for quantification of technetium-99

Matsueda, Makoto; Yanagisawa, Kayo*; Koarai, Kazuma; Terashima, Motoki; Fujiwara, Kenso; Abe, Hironobu; Kitamura, Akihiro; Takagai, Yoshitaka*

ACS Omega (Internet), 6(29), p.19281 - 19290, 2021/07

https://doi.org/10.1021/acsomega.1c02756

Online solid-phase extraction-inductively coupled plasma-quadrupole mass spectrometry with oxygen dynamic reaction cell (online SPE-ICP-MS-DRC) was shown to be a thorough automatic analytical system, circumventing the need for human handling. At three stepwise separations (SPE-DRC-Q mass filters), we showed that interference materials allowed the coexistence of abundance ratios of 1.510 for Tc/Mo. Using this optimized system, a detection limit of Tc was 9.3 pg/L (5.9 mBq/L) for a 50 mL injection and sequential measurements were undertaken at a cycle of 24 min/sample.

HAIROWorldPlugin operation manual

Suzuki, Kenta; Abe, Fumiaki; Yashiro, Hiroshi; Kawabata, Kuniaki

JAEA-Testing 2020-009, 254 Pages, 2021/03

JAEA-Testing-2020-009.pdf:18.61MB

This report is the user manual of HAIROWorldPlugin for Choreonoid. Our motivation is to develop a robot simulator based on Choreonoid for technological development to contribute the decommissioning work at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station of Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. Choreonoid is an open source simulator which calculates the behavior of robots. The plugin is an extended function of Choreonoid which provides simulated behavior and phenomenon related to decommissioning tasks utilizing remotely operated robots. In particular, we developed additional functionalities for simulating the behavior of an underwater swimming robot, the behavior of an unmanned aerial vehicle robot, low visibility camera images, network communication failures, etc., and packaged these in the plugin. This report describes the installation of the plugin to Choreonoid on Ubuntu18.04-LTS and parameter settings of the plugin by presenting snapshots of operation windows.

Thermally altered subsurface material of asteroid (162173) Ryugu

Kitazato, Kohei*; Milliken, R. E.*; Iwata, Takahiro*; Abe, Masanao*; Otake, Makiko*; Matsuura, Shuji*; Takagi, Yasuhiko*; Nakamura, Tomoki*; Hiroi, Takahiro*; Matsuoka, Moe*; et al.

Nature Astronomy (Internet), 5(3), p.246 - 250, 2021/03

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-020-01271-2

Here we report observations of Ryugu's subsurface material by the Near-Infrared Spectrometer (NIRS3) on the Hayabusa2 spacecraft. Reflectance spectra of excavated material exhibit a hydroxyl (OH) absorption feature that is slightly stronger and peak-shifted compared with that observed for the surface, indicating that space weathering and/or radiative heating have caused subtle spectral changes in the uppermost surface. However, the strength and shape of the OH feature still suggests that the subsurface material experienced heating above 300 C, similar to the surface. In contrast, thermophysical modeling indicates that radiative heating does not increase the temperature above 200 C at the estimated excavation depth of 1 m, even if the semimajor axis is reduced to 0.344 au. This supports the hypothesis that primary thermal alteration occurred due to radiogenic and/or impact heating on Ryugu's parent body.

Lattice Boltzmann modeling and simulation of forced-convection boiling on a cylinder

Saito, Shimpei*; De Rosis, A.*; Fei, L.*; Luo, K. H.*; Ebihara, Kenichi; Kaneko, Akiko*; Abe, Yutaka*

Physics of Fluids, 33(2), p.023307_1 - 023307_21, 2021/02

https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0032743

A Boiling phenomenon in a liquid flow field is known as forced-convection boiling. We numerically investigated the boiling system on a cylinder in a flow at a saturated condition. To deal with such a phenomenon, we developed a numerical scheme based on the pseudopotential lattice Boltzmann method. The collision was performed in the space of central moments (CMs) to enhance stability for high Reynolds numbers. Furthermore, additional terms for thermodynamic consistency were derived in a CMs framework. The effectiveness of the model was tested against some boiling processes, including nucleation, growth, and departure of a vapor bubble for high Reynolds numbers. Our model can reproduce all the boiling regimes without the artificial initial vapor phase. We found that the Nukiyama curve appears even though the focused system is the forced-convection system. Also, our simulations support experimental observations of intermittent direct solid-liquid contact even in the film-boiling regime.