February 2023

February 24, 2023March 9, 2023

Design of the first fusion laboratory experiment to achieve target gain

SPEAKER:

Dr. Andrea (Annie) Kritcher

Team lead in the Inertial Confinement Fusion program and Group leader in Design Physics

DATE/TIME:

FRI, 02/24/2023 - 11:00AM TO 12:00PM

LOCATION:

3105 ETCHEVERRY HALL

Spring 2023 Colloquium Series

The inertial fusion community have been working towards ignition for decades, since the idea of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) was first proposed by Nuckolls, et al., in 1972. On August 8, 2021 and Dec 5th 2022,the Lawson criterion for ignition was met and more fusion energy was created than laser energy incident on the target at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in Northern California. The first experiment produced a fusion yield of 1.35 MJ from 1.9 MJ of laserenergy and appears to have crossed the tipping-point of thermodynamic instability according to several ignition metrics. Building on this result, improvements were made to increase the fusion energy output to >3MJ from 2.05 MJ of laser energy on target, resulting in target gain exceeding unity for the first time in the laboratory. This result is important in that it proves that there is nothing fundamentally limiting controlled fusion energy gain in the laboratory.

Dr. Andrea (Annie) Kritcher is the principle designer for the first ever fusion ignition experiment in a laboratory at the National Ignition Facility in Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and is the team lead for integrated modeling within the Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF) leadership team at LLNL. Annie received her BS from the University of Michigan Nuclear Engineering department in 2005, and MS and PhD from the UC Berkeley Nuclear Engineering department in 2007 and 2009, and is a fellow of the American Physical Society (APS). Annie was first employed at the Lab as a summer intern in 2004, as an LLNL Lawrence Scholar during her time at UC Berkeley, as a Lawrence postdoctoral fellow in 2009 following completion of her Ph.D from UC Berkeley, and as technical staff in 2012.

Webinar Link

https://berkeley.zoom.us/j/97239764948

Webinar ID: 972 3976 4948

February 17, 2023March 9, 2023

Ab Astris ad Terram, ad Astra Iterum: Radiation Effects Engineering – An Overview

SPEAKER:

Greg Allen

Senior Radiation Effects Engineer, Center for Space Radiation Lead

DATE/TIME:

FRI, 02/17/2023 - 3:00PM TO 4:00PM

LOCATION:

3105 ETCHEVERRY HALL

Spring 2023 Colloquium Series

Abstract:

Radiation effects engineering is a highly multidisciplinary, rapidly growing field within the aerospace industry. NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s Greg Allen will be discussing the fundamentals of the field, focusing on Single Event Effects and the importance of accelerators such as LBNL’s 88” BASE facility to the success of NASA’s missions from the upcoming Europa Clipper to the Mars Helicopter, Ingenuity.

About the Speaker:

Greg Allen received a BS in Computer Engineering from CSU Chico in 2005 and joined JPL’s Radiation Effects Group after graduating. A recognized team leader in the Radiation Effects group at JPL as well as the radiation effects community, Greg has provided radiation effects support for dozens of NASA missions and tiger team efforts since 2005, providing flight programs electronic device and system level radiation effects analysis and mitigation strategies. Greg received NASA’s coveted Outstanding Leadership Award, is a Senior IEEE member, and has held many conference positions at the Nuclear Science Radiation Effects Conference and currently sits on the conference Steering Group. In addition to Greg’s responsibilities as the Center for Space Radiation co-lead, he is the Radiation Effects Group Lead and Single Event Effects Test Lead.

February 10, 2023February 27, 2023

Overview of INL RELAP5-3D system code and examples of application to reactor analysis.

SPEAKER:

Dr. Paolo BALESTRA

ART-GCR Methods Lead

DATE/TIME:

FRI, 02/10/2023 - 3:00PM TO 4:00PM

LOCATION:

3105 ETCHEVERRY HALL

Spring 2023 Colloquium Series

Abstract:

RELAP5-3D is the latest in the RELAP5 code series developed at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) for the analysis of transients and accidents in water–cooled nuclear power plants and related systems as well as the analysis of advanced reactor designs. The RELAP5–3D code is an outgrowth of the one-dimensional RELAP5/MOD3 code developed at INL. The most prominent attribute that distinguishes RELAP5–3D from its predecessors is the fully integrated, multi-dimensional thermal-hydraulic and kinetic modeling capability. In this talk we will go through some of these features and how they are used to perform reactor transient analysis. Modelling approaches and results from some of the recent activities performed at INL will be presented.

About the Speaker:

Dr. Paolo BALESTRA obtained his Ph.D. in energy and environment with focus on nuclear engineering in the 2017 at the “La Sapienza” University of Rome. He is currently working at the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) as lead of the methods of the Advanced Reactor Technology - Gas Cooled Reactor (ART-GCR) DoE Program and managing the High Temperature Gas cooled Reactor multiphysics area of the Nuclear Energy Advanced Modeling and Simulation (NEAMS) program. His current research efforts focus on development, Verification and Validation (V&V) of advanced Modelling and Simulation (M&S) tools for design and safety assessment of advanced reactor technology.

February 3, 2023February 27, 2023

Global Famine after Nuclear War

SPEAKER:

Professor Alan Robock
Department of Environmental Sciences
Rutgers University
New Brunswick, NJ, USA
http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/nuclear/
E-mail: robock@envsci.rutgers.edu

DATE/TIME:

FRI, 02/03/2023 - 3:00PM TO 4:00PM

LOCATION:

3105 ETCHEVERRY HALL

Spring 2023 Colloquium Series

Abstract:

The world as we know it could end any day as a result of an accidental nuclear war between the United States and Russia. The fires produced by attacks on cities and industrial areas would generate smoke that would blow around the world, persist for years, and block out sunlight, producing a nuclear winter. Because temperatures would plunge below freezing, crops would die and massive starvation could kill most of humanity. Even a nuclear war between new nuclear states, such as India and Pakistan, could produce climate change unprecedented in recorded human history and massive disruptions to the world’s food supply. In this talk Dr. Robock will show climate and crop model simulations, as well as analogs, that support this theory.

About the Speaker:

Dr. Alan Robock is a Distinguished Professor of climate science in the Department of Environmental Sciences at Rutgers University. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in 1970 with a B.A. in Meteorology, and from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with an S.M. in 1974 and Ph.D. in 1977, both in Meteorology. Before graduate school, he served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Philippines. He was a professor at the University of Maryland, 1977-1997, and the State Climatologist of Maryland, 1991-1997, before coming to Rutgers in 1998. Prof. Robock has published more than 490 articles on his research in the area of climate change, including more than 280 peer-reviewed papers. His areas of expertise include climate intervention (also called geoengineering), climatic effects of nuclear war, and effects of volcanic eruptions on climate. He serves as Associate Editor of Reviews of Geophysics, the most highly-cited journal in the Earth Sciences. His honors include being a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society (AMS), and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a recipient of the AMS Jule Charney Medal. Prof. Robock was a Lead Author of the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007). In 2017 the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for “for its work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its groundbreaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons” based partly on the work of Prof. Robock. In 2022, Prof. Robock was a winner of the Future of Life Award, “For reducing the risk of nuclear war by developing and popularizing the science of nuclear winter.”

February 3, 2023March 6, 2023

Managing Operational Risk in Nuclear Facilities with TensorFlow

SPEAKER:

William Zywiec

Staff Scientist and Group Leader in the Nuclear Criticality Safety Division at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

DATE/TIME:

FRI, 02/03/2018 - 3:00PM TO 4:00PM

LOCATION:

3105 Etcheverry

Abstract:

Since the discovery of fission and subsequent first criticality of Chicago Pile-1, more than 60 criticality accidents have occurred throughout the world. These accidents are divided into two categories: those that occur during critical experiments or operations with nuclear reactors, and those that occur in production facilities, more commonly referred to as process criticality accidents. I will provide a brief overview of a few historical process criticality accidents and near misses that have occurred in the United States, and then I’ll discuss ongoing research that is being done to develop and implement machine learning tools to assess and manage operational risk in modern nuclear facilities. I’ll wrap up the presentation by discussing the overlap between nuclear criticality safety and emergency response.

Bio:

William Zywiec is a Staff Scientist and Group Leader in the Nuclear Criticality Safety Division at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He currently leads several projects in California and Nevada that focus on radiation detection, nuclear threat assessment, and characterization of special nuclear material hold-up. He has a PhD in Systems Engineering from George Washington University, an MSE in Systems Engineering from Johns Hopkins University, and a BS in Nuclear Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Watch here

Webinar ID 972 3976 4948