RADENV · Radiation Protection and Environmental Impact of Future Accelerators

Final Activity Report Summary - RADENV (Radiation protection and environmental impact of future accelerators)

The RADENV project started on 1st September 2006 when the first early stage researcher (ESR) took up appointment and was completed on 28 February 2010. Progress throughout the duration of the contract was according to the original plan and the three Marie Curie fellows, Egidio Mauro, Sophie Mallows and Stefania Trovati, worked up to expectations. They were very enthusiastic and committed to their respective projects and fully profited of the training opportunities offered by the Marie Curie fellowship. The main aspect of their projects was Monte Carlo simulation with FLUKA, a state of the art radiation transport code used in high energy physics, radiation physics and radiation dosimetry. They also had some experimental activities, which were an essential training for a radiation physicist. Egidio Mauro and Stefania Trovati studied the response of neutron radiation detectors, namely rem counters, Bonner Sphere spectrometers and bubble detectors, with measurements in a reference high energy field at the European Organisation for Nuclear Radiation (CERN) and the subsequent data analysis. During the last period of her appointment Stefania also carried out measurements of nuclear fragmentation at the iThemba Labs in Cape Town, South Africa, which were subsequently used to validate the nuclear models implemented in FLUKA and used in the beta beam calculations, which was the main topic of her EST project. Sophie Mallows participated in activation measurements at SLAC, i.e. a high energy electron accelerator in the United States of America, in order to benchmark Monte Carlo simulations. Egidio Mauro's main task were the radiation protection (RP) studies for Linac4, the new 160 MeV proton injector that was under construction at CERN to replace the linac of 50 MeV. Egidio dealt with all RP aspects of the project, such as shielding, streaming of neutrons through waveguide and ventilation ducts and access maze and conception of a proper labyrinth design for all penetrations present in the shielding barriers; induced radioactivity in accelerator components, in dumps and in the air in the linac tunnel and expected dose rates. The RP studies done by Egidio were included in the 'Safety file' which was an essential step for the final approval of the Linac4 project. Once operational, Linac4 would provide protons to all CERN accelerators and experiments. Stefania Trovati worked on the radiological aspects of a Beta-Beam facility, a future particle accelerator for the generation of a pure beam of electron neutrinos and anti-neutrinos through the decay of radioactive ions. Her main tasks consisted in the design of the shielding for the rapid cycling synchrotron and for the decay ring, in calculating the doses to members of the general public and to the workers, due to air and material activation, and in performing radiation protection studies for the CERN proton synchrotron. The results of Stefania's work were included in the final report for the European Union on the beta beam study, within the Eurisol framework. Sophie Mallows worked on activation and radiation protection studies for the compact linear collider (CLIC). The radioactivity induced in the environment was an important consideration in the design and operation of a future electron collider for high energy physics. Using Monte Carlo simulations, Sophie studied the production of radioactive nuclides in present and future electron accelerators. She validated her simulations by irradiation experiments at the Stanford linear accelerator centre (SLAC), performed in collaboration with members of the RP groups of both SLAC and CERN. She did another series of benchmark experiments by irradiating metal samples with lower energy electrons at the CLIC Test Beam facility (CTF-3) at CERN. Sophie also contributed to the preliminary studies of radiation levels in the CLIC tunnel, investigating with FLUKA simulations issues such ambient dose equivalent rates, damage to electronic devices and damage to the quadrupole magnets.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз