3. DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM OR FUNCTION
Electronic legacy book on neutron transport analytical benchmarks with a set of computer codes in support of it.
The developers of computer codes involving neutron transport theory for nuclear engineering applications seldom apply analytical benchmarking strategies to ensure the quality of their programs. A major reason for this is the lack of analytical benchmarks and their documentation in the literature. The few such benchmarks that do exist are difficult to locate, as they are scattered throughout the neutron transport and radiative transfer literature. The motivation for this benchmark compendium, therefore, is to gather several analytical benchmarks appropriate for nuclear engineering applications under one cover. The following three subject areas are considered: neutron slowing down and thermalization without spatial dependence, one-dimensional neutron transport in infinite and finite media, and multidimensional neutron transport in a half-space and an infinite medium. Each benchmark is briefly described, followed by a detailed derivation of the analytical solution representation. Finally, a demonstration of the evaluation of the solution representation includes qualified numerical benchmark results. All accompanying computer codes are suitable for the PC computational environment and can serve as educational tools for courses in nuclear engineering. While this benchmark compilation does not contain all possible benchmarks, by any means, it does include some of the most prominent ones and should serve as a valuable reference.
Chapter 1 contains a detailed introduction to the different forms of the transport equation that are solved. Chapter 2 covers slowing down and thermalization in an infinite medium. Chapter 3 deals with one-group space dependent problems, including the classical Green's function and albedo problems in plane and cylindrical geometries. Chapter 4 presents two multigroup space-dependent applications. The compendium concludes with two multigroup, multidimensional cases in Chapter 5.
Twelve reference calculations in transport theory are presented in order of progressive complexity, from problems in only the energy or only the spatial variables to problems with both variables.
The set of FORTRAN programs for the benchmarks are included. Minor improvements have been implemented in version NEA-1827/02.
The book and the computer codes provide a basis for understanding the fundamental concepts of neutron transport theory. It includes recent theoretical as well as numerical advances in analytical benchmarking. Readers of the book and users of the computer codes provided will become familiar with analytical forms of the transport equation, analytical methods of solutions in various geometries, numerical evaluations of analytical representations, semi-analytical benchmarking techniques.