Estimation of production cross-sections, transmutation and gas generation from radionuclides (A ∼50-60) in fusion environment.

Degradation of material properties under neutron irradiation generates a requirement for studying effects on materials in a fusion environment and optimizing radiation-resistant materials for future applications. In the present work, the durability of stainless steel (SS) alloy used in ITER-like fusion devices is studied. We have predicted the amount of radionuclides produced in the material upon neutron irradiation at various locations is determined using the ACTYS, neutron activation code, for a typical one-dimensional geometry of ITER-like fusion reactor. The ACTYS code is further used to determine the gas production from 55Fe, 59Ni, and other long-lived radionuclides in the material. To further stress the importance of gas production in fusion materials, a comparative study of gas production cross-sections as given in various standard data libraries is examined using TALYS-1.8 and is presented in the paper.

Neutron activation cross-sections for Ytterbium isotopes at (14.6±0.3)MeV.

The cross-sections of (nat)Yb (n,x)(172,173) Tm, (174)Yb(n,p) (174) Tm, (174)Yb (n,α) (171)Er, (176)Yb(n,p) (176) Tm, (176)Yb(n,α)(173) Er, and (176) Yb(n,n')(176m)Yb have been measured at 14.6±0.3MeV neutron energy, among them two cross-sections (nat)Yb (n,x)(172,173)Tm are reported for the first time. These experimental cross-sections are compared with experimental data found in the literature, with evaluated nuclear data in JENDL-4.0 and TENDL-2010 libraries and with theoretically calculated values based on nuclear reaction modular codes EMPIRE-3.0 and TALYS-1.2.

HRTEM and FTIR investigation of nanosized zinc ferrite irradiated with 100 MeV oxygen ions.

Present work aims to investigate effect of 100 MeV oxygen ion irradiation on the vibrational modes of zinc ferrite nanoparticles. Nanosize zinc ferrite systems of different crystallite size ranging from 12-62 nm were irradiated at the fluence of 1×10(13) and 5×10(13) ions/cm(2). High resolution transmission electron micrograph study indicates the structural disorder induced by ion irradiation. Bands corresponding to various vibrational modes in Fourier transform infrared spectra exhibit changes and are affected by the crystallite size/microstructure of pristine samples. The irradiation induced changes are dominated for sample ZF1000.

Elemental profile of agricultural soil by the EDXRF technique and use of the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) method to interpret the complex data.

The elemental profile of agricultural soil is important to study the various mechanisms of interaction among elements and their roles in plants growth. The chosen study site was the long term fertilization experiment (LTFE) field of the G.B. Pant University. The concentrations of 16 elements, namely Mg, Al, Si, Ca, K, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Cu, Zn, Rb, Sr and Pb have been determined in the soil samples by the EDXRF technique. The PCA method is used to interpret the elemental concentrations data.