I-Corps: Reactor Neutrino Detector Technology

Virginia Polytechnic Institute And State University, Blacksburg VA

Investigators

Abstract

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project concerns potential applications of neutrino detector technology to the commercial reactor neutrino industry and verification schemes for nuclear nonproliferation. Neutrinos are a natural byproduct of the nuclear fission that powers nuclear reactors. Since neutrinos are only very weakly interacting, they stream out of the core, and through all the shielding, without being changed in anyway. Therefore, these neutrinos carry information about the fission reaction in the core, such as the reactor power and the mix of isotopes that are participating in the fission reaction, which may be hard to determine using conventional techniques. By detecting reactor neutrinos, it may be possible to image the spatial distribution of the fission reaction in the core. This information could be used to improve the efficiency of the reactor fuel burn. Plutonium production in the core could be tracked, and its removal from the core recorded, which could be used to ensure that no materials get diverted to other means, useful for monitoring in nuclear nonproliferation applications. This I-Corps project will further develop a new reactor neutrino detector technology. This technology uses a highly-segmented detector, made of cube of plastic scintillator, arrayed in planes, which are separated by sheets of a second scintillator which is used to tag neutrons. Combined these two elements are used to cleanly identify the two-part signature of a reactor neutrino interaction in a detector. Previous reactor neutrino detectors required meters of shielding to range out cosmic-rays which are the largest source of background. In this detector the segmentation is used to identify the specific pattern of the reactor neutrino interaction and reject backgrounds that would otherwise overwhelm the rare neutrino events. A recent deployment of a prototype detector to a commercial reactor resulted in a positive observation of neutrinos, demonstrating the feasibility of this unique approach to background reduction. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.