Analytical investigation of the properties of the neutron noise induced by vibrating absorber and fuel rods

Abstract

Abstract Analytical solution methods for the neutron noise in a one-dimensional multi-region system in two-group theory, which have so far been based on the adjoint function technique, are extended here to using the forward Green's function technique. The forward Green's functions were calculated analytically for a noise source in a core surrounded by reflector regions at both sides. It is shown that with symbolic computation methods, the forward Green's function can be used for the calculation of the space- and frequency-dependent noise in the first order approximation for arbitrary noise sources which have an analytical representation. The properties of the induced neutron noise were investigated for vibrations of both absorbers and fuel assemblies, with two representations of the noise sources: a point-like source which corresponds to the vibrations of a fuel rod, and a finite width source which corresponds to vibrations of a fuel assembly. The contributions of the components induced by the fluctuations of the various types of macroscopic cross sections in the total noise are also discussed and the information content of the noise in the fast group is explored for the identification of fuel assembly vibrations.