Instrumentation and Measurement Methods in Nuclear Environments

Sunday, November 1, 2015, 9:00 – 17:00
Location: Pacific Salon 3
Organizer: Abdallah Lyoussi  CEA/DEN – France

Instrumentation and measurement methods in nuclear environments are key aspects that contribute to the quality of scientific and technological programs in the fields of physics, energy, nuclear fuel cycle, safeguards and radioactive waste management. Furthermore, measurements relying on nuclear physics now play an important role in various fields of application such as biology, medicine and environment.

For nuclear physics and technology side, nuclear experimental/research reactors are widely used around the world for various purposes, such as irradiation of material or fuel samples for present and future power reactors, safety studies, assessment of neutronic parameters (such as neutron absorption cross sections or reaction rates), production of artificial radio-elements, etc.

A sustainable nuclear energy requires research on fuel and material behaviour under irradiation with a high level of performances in order to meet following needs for the benefit of industry and public bodies:

  • A constant improvement of the performances and safety of present and coming water cooled reactor technologies. Taking into account the lifetime extension and the progressive launch of generation III, nuclear power plants using water coolant will be in operation through the entire century. They will require a continuous R&D support following a long-term trend driven by the plant life management, safety demonstration, flexibility and economics improvement. Experimental irradiations of structure materials are necessary to anticipate these material behaviors and will contribute to the operation optimization.
  • Fuel technology in present and future nuclear power plants is continuously upgraded to achieve better performances and to optimize the fuel cycle, still keeping the best level of safety. Fuel evolution for generation II and III is and will stay a key stake requiring developments, qualification tests and safety experiments to ensure the competitiveness and safety: experimental tests exploring the full range of fuel behaviour determine fuel stability limits and safety margins, as a major input for the fuel reliability analysis.
  • To meet nuclear energy sustainable development objectives in the resources and waste management, generation IV reactors are mandatory and require innovative materials and fuels which resist to high temperatures and/or fast neutron flux in different environments. These environments will be needed for demonstrating the technical, economical and safety performances of these technologies.

To perform such accurate and innovative progress and developments, specific and ad hoc instrumentation, irradiation devices, measurement methods are necessary to be set up inside or beside the reactor core. These experiments require beforehand in situ and on line sophisticated measurements to accurately determine parameters such as thermal and fast neutron fluxes and nuclear heating in order to precisely monitor and control the conducted assays.

As entitled, this workshop deals with research, development and innovation in the frame of instrumentation and measurement dealing with nuclear experimental reactor such as ZPR (Zero Power Reactors), MTR (Material Testing Reactors), reactor demonstration prototypes for future nuclear power reactor / fission and fusion (GEN IV, ITER...) as well as nuclear fuel cycle, safeguards and homeland security and radioactive waste management.

Workshop topics will concern instrumentation and measurement in the following areas:

  • MTR (JHR, ATR, BR2, OSIRIS...) and ZPR instrumentation and measurement programs.
  • GENIII+ Research and Development program in the frame of instrumentation and measurements.
  • Future nuclear reactor programs GENIV (MYRHA, ASTRID, ITER...) and their specificities and needs regarding instrumentation and measurement technics and tools.
  • Advanced research programs in the field of instrumentation and measurement developments dedicated to nuclear experimental reactor.
  • Neutron and photon measurement tools and techniques within experimental reactor(s).

Instrumentation and measurement techniques and methodologies for nuclear material control and characterization (nuclear fuel, safeguards, non-proliferation, homeland security, radioactive waste...)

Satellite Workshop on Open Source Software in Medical Imaging

Saturday, 7 November, 2015, 13:00-16:30
Location: Pacific Salon 3
Organizers: Kris Thielemans, University College London & Charalampos Tsoumpas, University of Leeds

Open source software is established as one of the new successful ways of accelerating software development and scientific discoveries across different scientific domains. In tomography, several packages have been developed and extensively used. The aim of this workshop is to provide a comprehensive summary of existing packages in Medical Imaging relevant to the conference attendees. During this workshop experienced developers will present the most recent developments of image reconstruction software libraries and will include emphasis on software and algorithmic development. Additional time will be allowed for discussion between the speakers and the audience.

For further information about this workshop, please visit https://stir.sourceforge.net/MIC2015SatelliteWorkshop/.