Neutrons production on the IPHI accelerator for the validation of the design of the compact neutron source SONATE

Hoang Ngoc Tran,Frédéric Ott,Benoît Homatter,Jacques Darpentigny,Jérôme Schwindling,Nicolas Chauvin,Fabien Prunes,Alain Letourneau,Alain Menelle,Burkhard Annighöfer,Anthony Marchix

doi:10.1051/epjconf/202023101007

Hoang Ngoc Tran, Frédéric Ott + Show 9 more

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We aim at building a compact accelerator-based neutron source (CANS) which would provide a thermal neutron flux on the order of 4x1012 n.s-1.cm-2.sr-1. Such a brilliance would put compact neutron sources on par with existing medium flux neutron research reactors for neutron scattering experiments. We performed the first neutron production tests on the IPHI proton accelerator at Saclay at a proton energy of 3 MeV. The thermal neutron flux were measured using gold foil activation and 3He detectors. The measured flux were compared with GEANT4 Monte Carlo simulations (10.4) in which the whole experimental setup was modelled. There is a good agreement between the experimental measurements and the Monte-Carlo simulations. The available modelling tools will allow us to optimize the whole Target Moderator Reflector assembly together with the neutron scattering spectrometer geometries for the design of the neutron scattering facility SONATE.

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There is currently an interest in developing compact neutron sources based on low energy proton accelerators (10-100 MeV) [1]
This paper describes the experimental and simulation methods that was used to measure the thermal neutron flux inside and outside the moderator, including the thermal neutron spectra and the neutron beam divergences, as well as the fast-neutron angular distribution related to the reaction 9Be(p,n)
No data are available for 3 MeV protons, while they are needed for validating the models implemented in GEANT4 in the framework of the prototype tests at 3 MeV protons

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Introduction

There is currently an interest in developing compact neutron sources based on low energy proton accelerators (10-100 MeV) [1]. Such sources could serve as neutron sources for neutron scattering to replace small ageing nuclear reactors [2] or in hospitals for Boron Neutron Capture Therapy [3,4]. There are already several such projects on-going around the world They are generally referred to as CANS, Compact Accelerator-based Neutron Sources. Once reliable simulation tools are available we shall be able to reliably estimate the performances of a CANS for neutron scattering experiments (from the source to the spectrometers) and compare its performances to existing facilities (reactor or spallation based)

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