K-State engineers to develop neutron sensors for improved control, safety in advanced nuclear reactors
Wednesday, July 24, 2024
MANHATTAN — A trio of faculty members in the Carl R. Ice College of Engineering at Kansas State University is developing sensors designed to withstand one of the harshest operational environments ever created within the core of a nuclear reactor.
Walter McNeil, Steve Hsu keystone research scholar and associate professor in the Alan Levin Department of Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering, has received a nearly $500,000 grant from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to lead a team designing the sensors that will operate within the core of a nuclear reactor and provide new levels of control and safety.
McNeil will lead the three-year project, "Enhancement of Miniature In-Core Fission Chamber Technology for Advanced Reactor Applications," alongside co-principal investigators Amir Bahadori, recipient of the Hal and Mary Siegele Professorship in Engineering and associate professor, and Douglas McGregor, Boyd D. Brainard Departmental Faculty Chair in Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering and university distinguished professor.
McNeil said the new sensors are especially important for new types of reactors being designed that are more portable in nature.
"Newly emerging high-temperature reactors have extremely intense damaging radiation combined with operating temperatures sometimes exceeding 800 degrees Celsius," McNeil said. "Our team will mitigate high-temperature effects on micro-pocket fission detectors, previously demonstrated by Professor McGregor at K-State, taking the devices to unmatched levels of ruggedness and survivability.
"The combination of radiation and temperature faced by these sensors is nearly the harshest operational environment ever created by mankind, exceeded only by nuclear weapons."
