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Division Spotlight
Fusion Energy
This division promotes the development and timely introduction of fusion energy as a sustainable energy source with favorable economic, environmental, and safety attributes. The division cooperates with other organizations on common issues of multidisciplinary fusion science and technology, conducts professional meetings, and disseminates technical information in support of these goals. Members focus on the assessment and resolution of critical developmental issues for practical fusion energy applications.
Meeting Spotlight
Utility Working Conference and Vendor Technology Expo (UWC 2024)
August 4–7, 2024
Marco Island, FL|JW Marriott Marco Island
Standards Program
The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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NRC engineers share their expertise at the University of Puerto Rico
Robert Roche-Rivera and Marcos Rolón-Acevedo are licensed professional engineers who work at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. They are also alumni of the University of Puerto Rico–Mayagüez (UPRM) and have been sharing their knowledge and experience with students at their alma mater since last year, serving as adjunct professors in the university’s Department of Mechanical Engineering. During the 2023–2024 school year, they each taught two courses: Fundamentals of Nuclear Science and Engineering, and Nuclear Power Plant Engineering.
Syed Hameed Qaiser, Masood Iqbal, Aamer Iqbal Bhatti, Raza Samar, Javed Qadir
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 172 | Number 3 | November 2012 | Pages 327-336
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE11-46
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This paper discusses a higher-order sliding-mode-observer design for estimating reactivity in a nuclear research reactor. The nonlinear model of the Pakistan Research Reactor-1 (PARR-1) has been tuned and validated with experimental data. This model is then used for higher-order sliding-mode-observer-based reactivity estimation. In thermal reactors, reactivity is a very important reactor variable, as it determines the change of output power variation and is the main variable being manipulated for reactor power control. Linear observers have been used in the past to estimate reactivity, but the bandwidth is limited, and performance gets degraded as the operating point is changed. A nonlinear observer can efficiently address this problem. In this paper a robust higher-order sliding-mode observer is employed to estimate this variable. The higher-order sliding-mode observer is efficient and has the main advantage of reduced chattering. The estimators predict this variable with the measurement of neutron flux only. The estimated value is in close agreement with the theoretically calculated value.