Consistent adjustment of radioactive decay and fission yields data with measurement data of decay heat and [formula omitted]-delayed neutron activities

Abstract

Decay heat and delayed neutron yields, which are important physical quantities in the field of the nuclear engineering, are dependent on common nuclear data such as radioactive decay data and fission yields data of fission product nuclides. In the present study, correlations between uncertainties of these two quantities are investigated.Nuclear data relevant to uranium-235 and plutonium-239 fissions with thermal neutron are adjusted consistently with a procedure based on Bayes’ theorem using the measurement data of decay heat and delayed neutron activities. Numerical results suggest that the correlation between decay heat and delayed neutron activities uncertainties is not significant, and that independent treatments of decay heat or delayed neutron activities are possible. The effect of the consistent treatment of decay heat and delayed neutron activities is, however, observed in the adjustment results in some nuclear data such as uranium-235 thermal fission yields of yttrium-100m and zirconium-100.