Communications of the ACM
Ornl Simulating Japan Nuke Crisis
Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) are using supercomputer clusters to run simulations that could help resolve the nuclear crisis in Japan. The lab assembled a research team soon after the crisis began at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, says ORNL's Jeff Nichols.
One of the first issues the researchers studied involved simulations of what could be happening in the pools of used nuclear fuel that are stored in the reactor sites. Any new information the researchers gather is sent to U.S. Energy secretary Steven Chu. "They also have the ability to inform our Japanese counterparts over there and help guide them in their decision-making," Nichols says.
The research team is using programs developed by the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors, in addition to other programs that could be useful to the simulations, Nichols says.
From Knoxville News Sentinel
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