Reliability of CERN Simulation Software Proves Popular with Industry
The FLUKA.CERN (Fluka) simulation software and its graphical user interface FLAIR are proving popular with industry where a reliable and easy-to-use particle simulation toolkit is needed. Of the 13 licences provided by CERN in the past two years, eight have been for commercial purposes.
Fluka (FLUktuierende KAskade or Fluctuating Cascade) is like a “virtual laboratory” that helps scientists, engineers, and doctors figure out how radiation and particles behave in different environments. It saves time and resources by simulating experiments before doing them in real life using the Monte Carlo method.
FLUKA can simulate, with high accuracy, the interaction and propagation of around 60 different types of particles in matter, including photons and electrons from 1 keV to thousands of TeV, neutrinos, muons of any energy, hadrons of energies up to 20 TeV and all the corresponding antiparticles, neutrons down to thermal energies and heavy ions.
Its reliability as a tool is valued by many companies. Demcon Multiphysics is a Netherlands-based simulation consultancy that uses the Fluka software, in particular for its life sciences and health-related research.
In one example, the company used the software in a collaborative project called SMART, which aimed to design a novel facility capable of producing the radioactive isotope molybdenum-99 (99Mo) without nuclear waste.
99Mo is the parent nuclide of Technetium-99m, which is the most commonly used medical radioisotope in the world for medical imaging. Currently, 99Mo is produced from high-enriched uranium produced at nuclear research reactors, meaning nuclear waste is a necessary by-product.
SMART is based on a free-electron laser concept by Dutch company ASML and has reached the proof of concept stage. Demcon used Fluka in various ways during the project, such as for isotopic yield calculations, assessing the radiation safety of the facility for use by operators, the capability of materials for shielding from radiation, radiation damage to parts, and the activation of materials or components from radiation.
“Fluka really meets the requirements in running simulations in these instances – it is the programme to use,” said Bryan Verveld, business developer at Demcon Multiphysics.
Switzerland-based company Transmutex is also using Fluka for a range of purposes. The company is designing an innovative nuclear reactor technology called START (Subcritical Transmuting Accelerated Regenerative Technology) with the aim of alleviating the burden of long-lived nuclear waste by transmuting the existing stockpile of uranium spent fuel. START enables the reduction of both the volume and lifetime of the waste while breeding uranium 233 at scale to produce proliferation-resistant thorium fuel.
There are several advantages to Transmutex’s concept in addition to the fact that thorium is around three times more abundant than uranium, which is typically used in nuclear power plants. Transmutex’ proposed reactor is subcritical and driven by a high-power accelerator – meaning that neutron multiplication in the core can be safely controlled with the primary beam, averting any potential issues.
Transmutex is using Fluka as part of their work, to design the spallation target, a key component in the reactor that will produce the neutrons needed to sustain nuclear reactions in the START core. The company is also using it in other areas such as assessing needed radiation shielding and safety studies.
The software’s versatility, as well as its reliability, is highly valued.
“Thanks also to recent development of neutronics, Fluka is the best code for the design of high-power absorbing devices such as the START spallation target,” said Massimo Barbagallo, head of target group at Transmutex.
He also noted the ease in which users can quickly get up to speed in using the software thanks to FLAIR, the graphical user interface for Fluka.
“When you are a beginner, FLAIR speeds up the learning process significantly,” Barbagallo said. “This perfectly matches the needs of a company such as Transmutex to deliver – we want to spend as little time as possible getting up to speed with Fluka and this really helps.”