Nanotechnology in Nuclear Reactors: Innovations in Fusion and Fission Power Generation

This article explores the transformative potential of nanotechnology and MMs(memory metals)in enhancing the design and operation of nuclear reactors,encompassing both fission and fusion technologies.Nanotechnology,with its ability to engineer materials at the atomic scale,offers significant improvements in reactor safety,efficiency,and longevity.In fission reactors,nanomaterials enhance fuel rod integrity,optimize thermal management,and improve in-core instrumentation.Fusion reactors benefit from nanostructured materials that bolster containment and heat dissipation,addressing critical challenges in sustaining fusion reactions.The integration of SMAs(shape memory alloys),or MMs,further amplifies these advancements.These materials,characterized by their ability to revert to a pre-defined shape under thermal conditions,provide self-healing capabilities,adaptive structural components,and enhanced magnetic confinement.The synergy between nanotechnology and MMs represents a paradigm shift in nuclear reactor technology,promising a future of cleaner,more efficient,and safer nuclear energy production.This innovative approach positions the nuclear industry to meet the growing global energy demand while addressing environmental and safety concerns.

High-resolution neutronics model for ^(238)Pu production in high-flux reactors

We proposed and compared three methods(filter burnup,single energy burnup,and burnup extremum analysis)to build a high-resolution neutronics model for 238Pu production in high-flux reactors.The filter burnup and single energy burnup methods have no theoretical approximation and can achieve a spectrum resolution of up to~1 eV,thereby constructing the importance curve and yield curve of the full energy range.The burnup extreme analysis method combines the importance and yield curves to consider the influence of irradiation time on production efficiency,thereby constructing extreme curves.The three curves,which quantify the transmutation rate of the nuclei in each energy region,are of physical significance because they have similar distributions.A high-resolution neutronics model for ^(238)Pu production was established based on these three curves,and its universality and feasibility were proven.The neutronics model can guide the neutron spectrum optimization and improve the yield of ^(238)Pu by up to 18.81%.The neutronics model revealed the law of nuclei transmutation in all energy regions with high spectrum resolution,thus providing theoretical support for high-flux reactor design and irradiation production of ^(238)Pu.

An innovative approach to effective breeding blanket design for future fusion reactors

An effective breeding blanket is critical to support tritium self-sufficiency for future fusion reactors.The difficulty is to achieve tritium breeding ratio(TBR)target of 1.05 or more.This paper presents a new design approach to the blanket design process.It indicates that fusion blanket design is affected by universal functions based on iterations.Three aspects are worth more attention from fusion engineers in the future.The first factor is that the iterations on the material fractions affect not only structure scheme but also TBR variation.The second factor is the cooling condition affecting final TBR due to the change of the structure material proportion.The third factor is temperature field related to the tritium release.In particular,it is suggested that the statistical calculation of effective TBR must be under reasonable control of the blanket temperature field.This approach is novel for blanket engineering in development of a fusion reactor.

Engineering and Physical Bases of Development and Creation of Plasmochemical Reactors for Mobile Facilities for Medical Waste Disposal

This paper presents the results of the development and creation of plasma-chemical reactors for mobile and stationary installations for the destruction and disposal of solid, liquid, gaseous and mixed medical waste based on the domestic plasma generator PUN-1, with air as the plasma-forming gas. The design and principle of operation of plasma-chemical reactors installed on mobile experimental and industrial plants “Plazmon-1,2,3”, as well as the main features of the plasma waste disposal process are described.

Microchannel reactors for Fischer-Tropsch synthesis:Experimental investigation and mathematical modeling

The Fischer-Tropsch synthesis is a significant technology for converting coal,natural gas,and biomass into synthetic fuels.In recent years,the use of microchannel reactors for the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis has attracted significant attention.Fischer-Tropsch synthesis experiments were carried out in a microchannel reactor and the influences of reaction conditions on the experimental results were investigated in this study.Based on the experimental data,a dynamic multi-component pseudo-homogeneous variable-volume flow model of microchannel reactors for the Fischer-Tropsch synthesis was built to determine the pressure-,velocity-,conversion-and(component-wise)concentration-distributions in reaction channels.The model takes into account the combined effects of gas volume expansion caused by the frictional pressure drop and gas volume contraction caused by reaction consumption.A novel effective method for calculating the pressure and superficial gas velocity values in microchannel reactors was proposed in the model.Besides that,two sets of experimental data were selected from references to evaluate the validity and accuracy of the model.The reaction performances in the microchannels were analyzed carefully based on the calculated results.

Different efficiency toward the biomimetic aerobic oxidation of benzyl alcohol in microchannel and bubble column reactors: Hydrodynamic characteristics and gas–liquid mass transfer

The selective aerobic oxidation of benzyl alcohol to benzaldehyde has attracted considerable attention because benzaldehyde is a high value-added product. The rate of this typical gas–liquid reaction is significantly affected by mass transfer. In this study, CoTPP-mediated(CoTPP: cobalt(II) mesotetraphenylporphyrin) selective benzyl alcohol oxidation with oxygen was conducted in a membrane microchannel(MMC) reactor and a bubble column(BC) reactor, respectively. We observed that 83% benzyl alcohol was converted within 6.5 min in the MMC reactor, but only less than 10% benzyl alcohol was converted in the BC reactor. Hydrodynamic characteristics and gas–liquid mass transfer performances were compared for the MMC and BC reactors. The MMC reactor was assumed to be a plug flow reactor,and the dimensionless variance was 0.29. Compared to the BC reactor, the gas–liquid mass transfer was intensified significantly in MMC reactor. It could be ascribed to the high gas holdup(2.9 times higher than that of BC reactor), liquid film mass transfer coefficient(8.2 times higher than that of BC reactor), and mass transfer coefficient per unit interfacial area(3.8 times higher than that of BC reactor). Moreover,the Hatta number for the MMC reactor reached up to 0.61, which was about 15 times higher than that of the BC reactor. The computational fluid dynamics calculations for mass fractions in both liquid and gas phases were consistent with the experimental data.

Meta-analysis of CO_(2) conversion,energy efficiency,and other performance data of plasma-catalysis reactors with the open access PIONEER database

This paper brings the comparison of performances of CO_(2)conversion by plasma and plasma-assisted catalysis based on the data collected from literature in this field,organised in an open access online database.This tool is open to all users to carry out their own analyses,but also to contributors who wish to add their data to the database in order to improve the relevance of the comparisons made,and ultimately to improve the efficiency of CO_(2)conversion by plasma-catalysis.The creation of this database and database user interface is motivated by the fact that plasma-catalysis is a fast-growing field for all CO_(2)conversion processes,be it methanation,dry reforming of methane,methanolisation,or others.As a result of this rapid increase,there is a need for a set of standard procedures to rigorously compare performances of different systems.However,this is currently not possible because the fundamental mechanisms of plasma-catalysis are still too poorly understood to define these standard procedures.Fortunately however,the accumulated data within the CO_(2)plasma-catalysis community has become large enough to warrant so-called“big data”studies more familiar in the fields of medicine and the social sciences.To enable comparisons between multiple data sets and make future research more effective,this work proposes the first database on CO_(2)conversion performances by plasma-catalysis open to the whole community.This database has been initiated in the framework of a H_(2)0_(2)0 European project and is called the“PIONEER Data Base”.The database gathers a large amount of CO_(2)conversion performance data such as conversion rate,energy efficiency,and selectivity for numerous plasma sources coupled with or without a catalyst.Each data set is associated with metadata describing the gas mixture,the plasma source,the nature of the catalyst,and the form of coupling with the plasma.Beyond the database itself,a data extraction tool with direct visualisation features or advanced filtering functionalities has been developed and is available online to the public.The simple and fast visualisation of the state of the art puts new results into context,identifies literal gaps in data,and consequently points towards promising research routes.More advanced data extraction illustrates the impact that the database can have in the understanding of plasma-catalyst coupling.Lessons learned from the review of a large amount of literature during the setup of the database lead to best practice advice to increase comparability between future CO_(2)plasma-catalytic studies.Finally,the community is strongly encouraged to contribute to the database not only to increase the visibility of their data but also the relevance of the comparisons allowed by this tool.

System Variables Design of Safety Analysis for Fast Reactors

This research aims to examine the risk in the technology design of fast breeder reactors while the development depends on safety considerations. The project explored the variables, which could affect positively the expected average fuel burn-up, breeding ratio, and decay heat removal. That is accomplished using features such as guard vessels and elevated pipe routing to prevent the cracked state of both core components and fuel cladding interface conditions. So, the cracked region of fuel was detected by thermal-hydraulic analysis. We used ZrFeCr alloys to estimating of the rise in fuel cladding and coolant that can be incorporated in the design ZrFeCr alloys to uniform corrosion in temperature and 10.3 Mpa pressure. Fast creep of the reactor vessel during the coolant heat-up transient is another issue to be considered corrosion resistance of structural material can be achieved by controlling oxygen content in steel alloy. In this trend, S4337 S5140 steels are wide and can be used in future fossil power plants because of their excellent high-temperature strength.

Modeling and optimization of the cyclic steady state operation of adsorptive reactors

Adsorptive reactors(AR),in which an adsorptive functionality is incorporated into the catalytic reactors,offer enhanced performance over their conventional counterparts due to the effective manipulation of concentration and temperature profiles.The operation of these attractive reactors is,however,inherently unsteady state,complicating the design and operation of such sorption-enhanced processes.In order to capture,comprehend and capitalize upon the rich dynamic texture of adsorptive reactors,it is necessary to employ cyclic steady state algorithms describing the entire reaction-adsorption/desorption cycle.The stability of this cyclic steady state is of great importance for the design and operation of adsorptive reactors.In this paper,the cyclic steady state of previously proposed novel adsorptive reactor designs has been calculated and then optimized to give maximum space–time yields.The results obtained revealed unambiguously that an improvement potential of up to multifold level could be attained under the optimized cyclic steady state conditions.This additional improvement resulted from the reduction of the regeneration time well below the reaction-adsorption time,which means,in turn,more space–time yield.

The Statistical Experimental Design for Chemical Reactors Modeling

The Statistical Experimental Design techniques are the most powerful tools for the chemical reactors experimental modeling. Empirical models can be formulated for representing the chemical behavior of reactors with the minimal effort in the necessary number of experimental runs, hence, minimizing the consumption of chemicals and the consumption of time due to the reduction in the number of experimental runs and increasing the certainty of the results. Four types of nonthermal plasma reactors were assayed seeking for the highest efficiency in obtaining hydrogen and ethylene. Three different geometries for AC high voltage driven reactors, and only a single geometry for a DC high voltage pulse driven reactor were studied. According to the fundamental principles of chemical kinetics and considering an analogy among the reaction rate and the applied power to the plasma reactor, the four reactors are modeled following the classical chemical reactors design to understand if the behavior of the nonthermal plasma reactors can be regarded as the chemical reactors following the flow patterns of PFR (Plug Flow Reactor) or CSTR (Continuous Stirred Tank Reactor). Dehydrogenation is a common elimination reaction that takes place in nonthermal plasmas. Owing to this characteristic, a paraffinic heavy oil with an average molecular weight corresponding to C15 was used to study the production of light olefins and hydrogen.

Process Intensification in Pneumatically Agitated Slurry Reactors

Pneumatically agitated slurry reactors,including bubble column reactors and airlift loop reactors(ALRs),are important gas-liquid-solid multiphase reactors.These reactors have been widely applied in many processes,especially in the biological fermentation and energy chemical industry,due to their low shear stress,good mixing,perfect mass-/heat-transfer properties,and relatively low costs.To further improve the performance of slurry reactors(i.e.,mixing and mass/heat transfer)and to satisfy industrial require-ments(e.g.,temperature control,reduction of back-mixing,and product separation),the process intensi-fication of slurry reactors is essential.This article starts by reviewing the latest advancements in the intensification of mixing and mass/heat transfer in these two types of reactors.It then summarizes process-intensification methods for mixing and separation that allow continuous production in these slurry reactors.Process-intensification technology that integrates directional flow in an ALR with simple solid-liquid separation in a hydrocyclone is recommended for its high efficiency and low costs.This arti-cle also systematically addresses vital considerations and challenges,including flow regime discrimina-tion,gas spargers,solid particle effects,and other concerns in slurry reactors.It introduces the progress of numerical simulation using computational fluid dynamics(CFD)for the rational design of slurry reactors and discusses difficulties in modeling.Finally,it presents conclusions and perspectives on the design of industrial slurry reactors.

The Design and Control of Distillation Column with Side Reactors for Chlorobenzene Production

The distillation column with side reactors (SRC) can overcome the temperature/pressure mismatch in the traditional reactive distillation, the column operates at temperature/pressure favorable for vapor-liquid separation, while the reactors operate at temperatures/pressures favorable for reaction kinetics. According to the smooth operation and automatic control problem of the distillation column with side reactors (SRC), the design, simulation calculation and dynamic control of the SCR process for chlorobenzene production are discussed in the paper. Firstly, the mechanism models, the integrated structure optimal design and process simulation systems are established, respectively. And then multivariable control schemes are designed, the controllability of SRC process based on the optimal steady-state integrated structure is explored. The dynamic response performances of closed-loop system against several disturbances are discussed to verify the effectiveness of control schemes for the SRC process. The simulating results show that the control structure using conventional control strategies can effectively overcome feeding disturbances in a specific range.

Influences of fluid physical properties,solid particles,and operating conditions on the hydrodynamics in slurry reactors

Slurry reactors are popular in many industrial processes,involved with numerous chemical and biological mixtures,solid particles with different concentrations and properties,and a wide range of operating conditions.These factors can significantly affect the hydrodynamic in the slurry reactors,having remarkable effects on the design,scale-up,and operation of the slurry reactors.This article reviews the influences of fluid physical properties,solid particles,and operating conditions on the hydrodynamics in slurry reactors.Firstly,the influence of fluid properties,including the density and viscosity of the individual liquid and gas phases and the interfacial tension,has been reviewed.Secondly,the solid particle properties(i.e.,concentration,density,size,wettability,and shape)on the hydrodynamics have been discussed in detail,and some vital but often ignored features,especially the influences of particle wettability and shape,as well as the variation of surface tension because of solid concentration alteration,are highlighted in this work.Thirdly,the variations of physical properties of fluids,hydrodynamics,and bubble behavior resulted from the temperature and pressure variations are also summarized,and the indirect influences of pressure on viscosity and surface tension are addressed systematically.Finally,conclusions and perspectives of these notable influences on the design and scale-up of industrial slurry reactors are presented.

Immobilized enzyme reactors in HPLC and its application in inhibitor screening:A review

This paper sets out to summarize the literatures based on immobilized enzyme bio-chromatography and its application in inhibitors screening in the last decade.In order to screen enzyme inhibitors from a mass of compounds in preliminary screening,multi-pore materials with good biocompatibility are used for the supports of immobilizing enzymes,and then the immobilized enzyme reactor applied as the immobilized enzyme stationary phase in HPLC.Therefore,a technology platform of high throughput screening is gradually established to screen the enzyme inhibitors as new anti-tumor drugs.Here,we briefly summarize the selective methods of supports,immobilization techniques,co-immobilized enzymes system and the screening model.

Development of Linearizing Feedback Control with a Variable Structure Observer for Continuous Stirred Tank Reactors

This paper deals with the design of an observer-based nonlinear control for continuous stirred tank reactors(CSTR).A variable structure observer is constructed to estimate the whole process state variables.This observer is basically the conventional Luenberger observer with an additional switching term used to guarantee the robustness against modeling errors.The observer is coupled with a nonlinear controller,designed based on input-output linearization for controlling the reactor temperature.The asymptotical stability of the closed-loop system is shown by the Lyapunov stability theorem.Finally,computer simulations are developed for showing the performance of the proposed approach.

Investigation of extraction fraction in confined impinging jet reactors for tri-butyl-phosphate extracting butyric acid process

The extraction fraction E and overall volumetric mass transfer coefficient kka of TBP extracting butyric acid pro- cess in confined impinging jet reactors （CIJR） with two jets were investigated. The main variables tested were the concentration of tri-butyl-phosphate （TBP） and butyric acid, the impinging velocity V, the impinging velocityratio of two phases Vorg/Vaq, the nozzle inner diameter di and the distance L between the jet axes and the top wall of the impinging chamber. The results showed that E and kLa increase with an increase of the impinging velocity V, the concentration ofTBP Corg, and the impinging velocity ratio Vor/Vaq. However, E and kta decrease with an increase of the inner diameter d1 from 1 to 2 mm, the concentration of butyric acid Caq from 0.5% （v/v） to 2% （v/v）. The factor L ranging from 3 to 11 mm has a negligible effect on E and kLa. A correlation on these variables and kLa was proposed based on the experimental data. These results indicated good mass transfer oerformance of CIJR in the extraction operation.

Review on the effect of heat exchanger tubes on flow behavior and heat/mass transfer of the bubble/slurry reactors

Bubble/Slurry bubble column reactors(BCR/SBCR)are intensively used as multiphase reactors for a wide range of application in the chemical,biochemical and petrochemical industries.Most of these applications involve complicate gas–liquid/gas–liquid–solid flow behavior and exothermic process,thus it is necessary to equip the BCR/SBCR with heat exchanger tubes to remove the heat and govern the performance of the reactor.Amounts of experimental and numerical studies have been carried out to describe the phenomena taking place in BCR/SBCRs with heat exchanger tubes.Unfortunately,little effort has been put on reviewing the experiments and simulations for examining the effect of internals on the performance and hydrodynamics of BCR/SBCR.The objective of this work is to give a state-of-the-art review of the literature on the effects of heat exchanger tubes with different types and configurations on flow behavior and heat/mass transfer,then provide adequate information and scientific basis for the design and the development of heat exchanger tubes in BCR/SBCR,ultimately provide reasonable suggestions for better comprehend the performance of different heat exchanger tubes on hydrodynamics.

MPC of distillation column with side reactors for methyl acetate

This paper focuses on the dynamic control of distillation column with side reactors(SRC) for methyl acetate production. To obtain the optimum integrated structure and steady state simulation, the systematic design approach based on the concept of independent reaction amount is applied to the process of SRC for methyl acetate production. In addition to the basic control loops, multi-variable model predictive control modular with methyl acetate concentration and temperature of sensitive plate is designed. Then, based on process simulation software Aspen Plus, dynamic simulation of SRC for methyl acetate production is used to verify the effectiveness of the control scheme.

Effect of vacuum gas oil hydrotreating reactor on multiple reactors and hydrogen network

The inlet temperature of the Vacuum Gas Oil(VGO)hydrotreating reactor of a refinery is analyzed with the integration of multiple series reactors and hydrogen network considered.The effect of the inlet temperature(T1)on hydrogen sinks/sources and the product output is analyzed systematically based on the simulation of the series reactors,including VGO hydrotreating reactor,hydrocracking reactor,fluid catalytic cracking reactor and visbreaking reactor.The general relation between the Hydrogen Utility Adjustment(HUA)and multiple pairs of varying sinks and sources is deduced,and correlations between varying streams and T1 are linearly fitted.Based on this,the quantitative equation between HUA and T1 is derived,and corresponding diagram is constructed.The T1 corresponding the minimum hydrogen consumption is identified to be 345°C.

ON THE RESPONSE FUNCTION AND RESIDENCE TIME DISTRIBUTION OF THE AXIAL DISPERSION MODEL FOR TUBULAR REACTORS

In view of confusion on the residence time distribution and transfer fucntions for dispersion models, the solution of the model subject to possible combinations of closed and open type boundaries at the ends of a chemical reactor is investigated systematically. In particular, some new results are obtained for the closed-open and open-closed types of reactors. It is found that the interchange of boundary conditions for these reactors is not immaterial. In several cases, caution is necessary to distinguish whether the transfer function is applied to the concentration or the flux. When the dispersive flux is notable, measurement techniques must be carefully selected to match the kind of transfer functions derived.