Calculation of Control Rods Reactivity Worth of RSG-GAS First Core Using Deterministic and Monte Carlo Methods

The control rod worth is a key parameter for the research reactor operation and utilization. Control rod worth computation is a challenge for the fully-deterministic and Monte Carlo calculations, including the few-group cross section generation, and the core analysis. The safe and reliable utilization of research reactor demands the possible accurate information of control rod worth because they are used to compensate the excess reactivity for safe reactor operation and its controlled shut down. The criticality positions of the control rods change with time due to buildup of fission products during the reactor operation. It is therefore important to determine the reactivity worth of control rods. The aim of this article is to obtain reliable control rod worth of the first core of RSG-GAS as a verification and validation result. For this purpose, deterministic and Monte Carlo models of the reactor core were developed and confirmed by the experimental results of excess reactivity, shutdown margin, and combined control rod reactivity worth using the combination of WIMSD-5B and Batan-3DIFF computer codes. WIMSD-5B is a neutron transport theory-based lattice cell modeling code that is used for the generation of group constants for different regions of the reactor core. These are provided as input to the diffusion theory based Batan-3DIFF code which performs the global core calculations for the reactor system. For the Monte Carlo model, to estimate the reactivity worth of control rods, the MCNP6 code is used. The result of this analysis showed that for the integral control rod worth a good agreement was found between experimental data and Monte Carlo simulation results but up to 5 % difference occurred between experimental results and diffusion result

Microscopic analysis of the chemical reaction between Fe(Te,Se) thin films and underlying CaF2_2

To understand the chemical reaction at the interface of materials, we performed a transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observation in four types of Fe(Te,Se) superconducting thin films prepared on different types of substrates: CaF2 substrate, CaF2 substrate with a CaF2 buffer layer, CaF2 substrate with a FeSe buffer layer, and a LaAlO3 substrate with a CaF2 buffer layer. Based on the energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometer (EDX) analysis, we found possible interdiffusion between fluorine and selenium that has a strong influence on the superconductivity in Fe(Te,Se) films. The chemical interdiffusion also plays a significant role in the variation of the lattice parameters. The lattice parameters of the Fe(Te,Se) thin films are primarily determined by the chemical substitution of anions, and the lattice mismatch only plays a secondary role.Comment: 30 pages, 9 figur

Pure nematic state in iron-based superconductor

Lattice and electronic states of thin FeSe films on LaAlO$_3$ substrates are investigated in the vicinity of the nematic phase transition. No evidence of structural phase transition is found by x-ray diffraction below $T^\ast \sim 90$ K, while results obtained from resistivity measurement and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy clearly show the appearance of a nematic state. These results indicate formation of a pure nematic state in the iron-based superconductor and provide conclusive evidence that the nematic state originates from the electronic degrees of freedom. This pure nematicity in the thin film implies difference in the electron-lattice interaction from bulk FeSe crystals. FeSe films provide valuable playgrounds for observing the pure response of "bare" electron systems free from the electron-lattice interaction, and should make important contribution to investigate nematicity and its relationship with superconductivity

Dark matter wants Linear Collider

One of the main purposes of physics at the International Linear Collider (ILC) is to study the property of dark matter such as its mass, spin, quantum numbers, and interactions with particles of the standard model. We discuss how the property can or cannot be investigated at the ILC using two typical cases of dark matter scenario: i) most of new particles predicted in physics beyond the standard model are heavy and only dark matter is accessible at the ILC, and ii) not only dark matter but also other new particles are accessible at the ILC. We find that, as can be easily imagined, dark matter can be detected without any difficulties in the latter case. In the former case, it is still possible to detect dark matter when the mass of dark matter is less than a half mass of the higgs boson