Achievements in Testing of the MGA and FRAM Isotopic Software Codes under the DOE/NNSA-IRSN Cooperation on Gamma-Ray Isotopic Measurement Systems

Year
2009
Author(s)
Duc T. Vo - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Tzu-Fang Wang - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Pierre Funk - Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire
Anne-Laure Weber - IRSN/DEND/SATE
Nicolas Pepin - Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire, France
Abstract
DOE/NNSA and IRSN collaborated on a study of gamma-ray instruments and analysis methods used to perform isotopic measurements of special nuclear materials. The two agencies agreed to collaborate on the project in response to inconsistencies that were found in the various versions of software and hardware used to determine the isotopic abundances of uranium and plutonium. IRSN used software developed internally to test the MGA and FRAM isotopic analysis codes for criteria used to stop data acquisition. The stop-criterion test revealed several unusual behaviors in both the MGA and FRAM software codes.