Minimum dose path planning for facility inspection based on the discrete Rao-combined ABC algorithm in radioactive environments with obstacles

Workers who conduct regular facility inspections in radioactive environments will inevitably be affected by radiation.Therefore,it is important to optimize the inspection path to ensure that workers are exposed to the least amount of radiation.This study proposes a discrete Rao-combined artificial bee colony(ABC)algorithm for planning inspection paths with minimum exposure doses in radioactive environments with obstacles.In this algorithm,retaining the framework of the traditional ABC algorithm,we applied the directional solution update rules of Rao algorithms at the employed bee stage and onlooker bee stage to increase the exploitation ability of the algorithm and implement discretion using the swap operator and swap sequence.To increase the randomness of solution generation,the chaos algorithm was used at the initialization stage.The K-opt operation technique was introduced at the scout bee stage to increase the exploration ability of the algorithm.For path planning in an environment with complex structural obstacles,an obstacle detour technique using a recursive algorithm was applied.To evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm,we performed experimental simulations in three hypothetical environments and compared the results with those of improved particle swarm optimization,chaos particle swarm optimization,improved ant colony optimization,and discrete Rao’s algorithms.The experimental results show the high performance of the proposed discrete Rao-combined ABC algorithm and its obstacle detour capability.

Levels and behavior of environmental tritium in East Asia

For a more systematic understanding of the levels of environmental tritium and its behavior in East Asia,a database on environmental tritium was established based on the literature published in the past 30 years.Subsequently,the levels and behavior of the environmental tritium were further studied by statistical analyses.The results indicate that the distribution of environmental tritium is inhomogeneous and complex.In areas without nuclear facilities,the level of environmental tritium has decreased to its background level,even though a certain number of atmospheric nuclear tests were performed before 1980.In general,the level of atmospheric tritium was marginally higher than the levels in precipitation and surface water;the levels in shallow groundwater and seawater were considerably lower.Furthermore,the levels of tritium in the atmosphere,precipitation,and inland surface water were strongly correlated with latitude and distance from the coastline.In soil and living organisms,the level of tissue-free water tritium(TFWT)was comparable to the tritium levels in local rainfall,whereas the persistence of organically bound tritium(OBT)in the majority of organisms resulted in an OBT/TFWT ratio greater than one.Conversely,extremely high levels of environmental tritium were observed near certain nuclear power plants and the Fukushima accident sites.These results highlight the requirement to know the tritium baseline level and its behavior in the environment beforehand to better assess the impact of tritium discharge.Further investigations of environmental tritium in East Asia using more efficient and adequate monitoring methods are also required.

SECURITY UPDATE

Just when world leaders thought that they could breathe easily after the successful Iran nuclear deal,nuclear security issues have been catapulted to the top of their agendas following North Korea’s recent testing of its nuclear bombs’capabilities.