Progress in Spectral Nodal Methods for Deterministic Neutral Particle Transport

Abstract

This talk will focus on the research progress in a class of coarse-mesh numerical methods for neutral particle transport calculations in the discrete ordinates (Sn) formulation, referred to as the spectral nodal methods.  This class of methods is based on preserving, in the discretized Sn equations, the local general solution within a homogenized region of the domain, which is obtained by a spectral analysis of the Sn equations.  In slab geometry the spectral nodal methods generate numerical solutions that are completely free of spatial truncation errors.  In multidimensional rectangular geometries, the spectral nodal methods are based on transverse integrations along the coordinate directions within each discretization node of the spatial grid.  These “one-dimensional” transverse-integrated Sn nodal equations are then solved analytically with approximations only in the transverse leakage terms, in contrast to classical Sn nodal methods, which approximate both the transverse leakages and the source terms.

About the Speaker

Dr. Ricardo C. Barros is the Head of the Polytechnic Institute (IPRJ) at the State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ) in Nova Friburgo, Brazil.  He has also served as the Head of the Department of Computational Modeling at IPRJ and Director of the Department for the Graduate Programs at UERJ. Dr. Barros received the BS degree in Physics from UERJ in 1981.  He later received an MS in Nuclear Engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) in 1985, and a Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from The University of Michigan in 1990. Dr. Barros was the recipient of the American Nuclear Society's Mark Mills Award, in 1991.