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At least 397 records · Page 22

International challenge to predict the impact of radioxenon releases from medical isotope production on a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty sampling station

Abstract The International Monitoring System (IMS) is part of the verification regime for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban-Treaty Organization (CTBTO). At entry-into-force, half of the 80 radionuclide stations will be able to measure concentrations of several radioactive xenon isotopes produced in nuclear explosions, and then the full network may be populated with xenon monitoring afterward (Bowyer et al., 2013). Fission-based production of 99Mo for medical purposes also releases radioxenon isotopes to the atmosphere (Saey, 2009). One of the ways to mitigate the effect of emissions from medical isotope production is the use of stack monitoring data, if it were available, so that the effect of radioactive xenon emissions could be subtracted from the effect from a presumed nuclear explosion, when detected at an IMS station location. To date, no studies have addressed the impacts the time resolution or data accuracy of stack monitoring data have on predicted concentrations at an IMS station location. Recently, participants from seven nations used atmospheric transport modeling to predict the time-history of 133Xe concentration measurements at an IMS station in Germany using stack monitoring data from a medical isotope production facility in Belgium. Participants received only stack monitoring data and used the atmospheric transport model and meteorological data of their choice. Some of the models predicted the highest measured concentrations quite well (a high composite statistical model comparison rank or a small mean square error with the measured values). The results suggest release data on a 15 min time spacing is best. The model comparison rank and ensemble analysis suggests that combining multiple models may provide more accurate predicted concentrations than any single model. Further research is needed to identify optimal methods for selecting ensemble members and those methods may depend on the specific transport problem. None of the submissions based only on the stack monitoring data predicted the small measured concentrations very well. The one submission that best predicted small concentrations also included releases from nuclear power plants. Modeling of sources by other nuclear facilities with smaller releases than medical isotope production facilities may be important in discriminating those releases from releases from a nuclear explosion.

133Xe↗

Detector Characterization for Quantitative Spectral Radiography of Uranium Powder Samples

Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is developing a prototype spectral x-ray radiography (SpecX) non-destructive assay system for noninvasive material mass quantification of uranium-bearing powders. The SpecX system uses a custom material estimation algorithm, which requires a high-fidelity pixel-by-pixel detector response model for accurate quantification. We performed a detailed characterization and built a model of a High-Energy X-ray Imaging Technology (HEXITEC) CdTe pixelated spectral detector. Here we present the detector characterization which led to that model, including a determination of the pixel-wise energy calibration, the detection efficiency, the detector uniformity, the detector stability, and a comparison of methods to remove charge-shared events.

spectral X-ray radiography, pixelated detector, ca↗

Monte Carlo simulations of channeling spectra recorded for samples containing complex defects

The main aim of the present paper is to describe the current status of the development of McChasy, a Monte Carlo simulation code, to make it suitable for the analysis of dislocations and dislocation loops in crystals. Such factors like the shape of the bent channel and geometrical distortions of the crystalline structure in the vicinity of dislocation has been discussed. Several examples of the analysis performed at different energies of analyzing ions are presented. The results obtained demonstrate that the new procedure applied to the spectra recorded on crystals containing dislocation yields damage profiles which are independent of the energy of the analyzing beam.

Carlo↗

Ceramic micro-injection molded nozzles for serial femtosecond crystallography sample delivery

Serial femtosecond crystallography (SFX) using X-ray Free-Electron Lasers (XFELs) allows for room temperature protein structure determination without evidence of conventional radiation damage. In this method, a liquid suspension of protein microcrystals can be delivered to the X-ray beam in vacuum as a micro-jet, which replenishes the crystals at a rate that exceeds the current XFEL pulse repetition rate. Gas dynamic virtual nozzles produce the required micrometer-sized streams by the focusing action of a coaxial sheath gas and have been shown to be effective for SFX experiments. Here, we describe the design and characterization of such nozzles assembled from ceramic micro-injection molded outer gas-focusing capillaries. Trends of the emitted jet diameter and jet length as a function of supplied liquid and gas flow rates are measured by a fast imaging system. The observed trends are explained by derived relationships considering choked gas flow and liquid flow conservation. Finally, the performance of these nozzles in a SFX experiment is presented, including an analysis of the observed background.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

Binary frequencies in a sample of globular clusters. II. Sample analysis and comparison to models

Binary stars are predicted to have an important role in the evolution of globular clusters, so we obtained binary fractions for 35 globular clusters that were imaged in the F606W and F814W with the Advanced Camera for Surveys on the Hubble Space Telescope. When compared to the values of prior efforts, we find significant discrepancies, despite each group correcting for contamination effects and having performed the appropriate reliability tests. The most reliable binary fractions are obtained when restricting the binary fraction to q⩾0.5. Our analysis indicates that the range of the binary fractions is nearly an order of magnitude for the lowest dynamical ages, suggesting that there is a broad distribution in the binary fraction at globular cluster formation. Dynamical effects also appear to decrease the core binary fractions by a factor of two over a Hubble time, but this is a weak relationship. We confirm a correlation from previous work that the binary fraction within the core–radius decreases with cluster age, indicating that younger clusters formed with higher binary fractions. The strong radial gradient in the binary fraction with cluster radius appears to be a consequence of dynamical interactions. It is often not present in dynamically young clusters, but is nearly always present in dynamically old clusters.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

First frontier field constraints on the cosmic star formation rate density AT z ~ 10—the impact of lensing shear on completeness of high-redshift galaxy samples

In this work, we search the complete Hubble Frontier Field data set of Abell 2744 and its parallel field for $z\sim 10$ sources to further refine the evolution of the cosmic star formation rate density (SFRD) between $z\sim 8$ and $z\sim 10$. We independently confirm two images of the recently discovered triply imaged $z\sim 9.8$ source by Zitrin et al. and set an upper limit for similar $z\sim 10$ galaxies with red colors of ${J}_{125}-{H}_{160}\gt 1.2$ in the parallel field of Abell 2744. We utilize extensive simulations to derive the effective selection volume of Lyman-break galaxies at $z\sim 10$, both in the lensed cluster field and in the adjacent parallel field. Particular care is taken to include position-dependent lensing shear to accurately account for the expected sizes and morphologies of highly magnified sources. We show that both source blending and shear reduce the completeness at a given observed magnitude in the cluster, particularly near the critical curves. These effects have a significant, but largely overlooked, impact on the detectability of high-redshift sources behind clusters, and substantially reduce the expected number of highly magnified sources. The detections and limits from both pointings result in an SFRD which is consistent within the uncertainties with previous estimates at $z\sim 10$ from blank fields. The combination of these new results with all other estimates is also consistent with a rapidly declining SFRD in the 170 Myr from $z\sim 8$ to $z\sim 10$ as predicted by cosmological simulations and dark-matter halo evolution in ΛCDM. Once biases introduced by magnification-dependent completeness are accounted for, the full six cluster and parallel Frontier Field program will be an extremely powerful new data set to probe the evolution of the galaxy population at $z\gt 8$ before the advent of the James Webb Space Telescope.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗