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Conference Spotlight
Nuclear Energy Conference & Expo (NECX)
September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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The RAIN scale: A good intention that falls short
Radiation protection specialists agree that clear communication of radiation risks remains a vexing challenge that cannot be solved solely by finding new ways to convey technical information.
Earlier this year, an article in Nuclear News described a new radiation risk communication tool, known as the Radiation Index, or, RAIN (“Let it RAIN: A new approach to radiation communication,” NN, Jan. 2025, p. 36). The authors of the article created the RAIN scale to improve radiation risk communication to the general public who are not well-versed in important aspects of radiation exposures, including radiation dose quantities, units, and values; associated health consequences; and the benefits derived from radiation exposures.
H. Park, D. A. Knoll, D. R. Gaston, R. C. Martineau
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 166 | Number 2 | October 2010 | Pages 118-133
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE09-104
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
We have developed a tightly coupled multiphysics simulation tool for the pebble bed reactor (PBR) concept, a specific type of very high temperature gas-cooled reactor. The simulation tool PRONGHORN takes advantage of the Multiphysics Object-Oriented Simulation Environment library and is capable of solving multidimensional thermal-fluid and neutronics problems implicitly with a Newton-based approach. Expensive Jacobian matrix formation is alleviated via the Jacobian-free Newton-Krylov method, and physics-based preconditioning is applied to minimize Krylov iterations. Motivation for the work is provided via analysis and numerical experiments on simpler multiphysics reactor models. We then provide detail of the physical models and numerical methods in PRONGHORN. Finally, PRONGHORN's algorithmic capability is demonstrated on a number of PBR test cases.