| About this Abstract |
| Meeting |
2023 TMS Annual Meeting & Exhibition
|
| Symposium
|
Seaborg Institutes: Emerging Topics in Actinide Materials and Science
|
| Presentation Title |
Oh, My Darling Clementine: A Contemporary Investigation of the Los Alamos Plutonium Fast Reactor |
| Author(s) |
Hannah K. Patenaude, Vedant Mehta, Franz J. Freibert |
| On-Site Speaker (Planned) |
Hannah K. Patenaude |
| Abstract Scope |
At the end of WWII, a group of Los Alamos pioneering researchers led by Jane and David Hall designed and built the world’s first fast reactor nicknamed “Clementine”. This reactor was unique in many aspects as a critically important high intensity fission-neutron source, novel platform to prove the adaptability of plutonium as a metallic reactor fuel, and utilized a first-of-a-kind heavy metal coolant in the form of liquid mercury. Clementine’s Pu alloy core fissioned on the fast neutron spectrum and was used to acquire a variety of neutron cross sections. Furthermore, Clementine provided information about fast reactors, including control characteristics and nuclear breeding properties of thorium and uranium required for production of commercial power and generation of fissile materials. With the aid of well-archived design information and experimental data, we are conducting a modern reactor analysis of Clementine to further explore and characterize this singularly unique experimental device. LA-UR-22-25668. |
| Proceedings Inclusion? |
Planned: |
| Keywords |
Nuclear Materials, Modeling and Simulation, Computational Materials Science & Engineering |