TopAct: Automated Translation from CAD to Combinatorial Geometry for Radiation Transport Analysis

Abstract

*† ‡ Modeling of complex three-dimensional engineered systems in the standard radiation transport tools MCNP and TART has traditionally been inhibited by geometry concerns. Most of these systems are designed in the framework of a commercial Computer Aided Design (CAD) package, but the geometrical paradigms used in these products are fundamentally different from the Combinatorial Geometry (CG) framework used in the radiation transport codes. Engineers at Raytheon Missile Systems have developed an automated system for bridging the gap between CAD and combinatorial geometries; it is named TopAct, for “Translation Optimization for Part-wise Adaptive Combinatorial Transport”. TopAct has been demonstrated to provide highly accurate, efficient CG representations of real-world parts designed in the ProEngineer CAD system. TopAct thus enables substantial cost savings in the production of radiation transport geometry models, along with attendant benefits in the complexity and accuracy of these models.