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News article16 April 2020

Non-destructive analysis of samples at GELINA facility

multi-scintillation-array-at-gelina.jpg
Multi scintillation array at Gelina
© EU 2020

The development of methods for non-destructive analysis of materials and objects based on neutron resonance spectroscopy is a spin-off of the nuclear data activities at the time-of-flight facility GELINA operated by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) at Geel site.

This activity started in 2000 through a collaboration with the Delft University of Technology (NL) to study objects for cultural heritage applications. It resulted in the development of Neutron Resonance Capture Analysis (NRCA) and Neutron Resonance Transmission Analysis (NRTA). Recently, NRTA was proposed as a technique to determine the elemental and isotopic composition of complex nuclear materials such as debris of melted fuel and segments of spent fuel rods. The use of NRTA for such applications is discussed in a paper that is published in the Journal of Analytical and Atomic Spectrometry and can be downloaded from the Royal Society of Chemistry website.

Analytical models for the analysis of spent fuel segments are presented and validated by experimental data obtained at GELINA. This work is part of a collaboration with the CEA Cadarache and JAEA and is supported by the open access programme EUFRAT of the JRC at Geel.

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Publication date
16 April 2020