The impact of the 7Li(n,n'α)T secondary neutron spectrum on the tritium breeding in 7Li

In this paper, the authors elucidate the role of inelastic scatterings from the high levels of 7Li in the tritium breeding in this material. This is done by calculating the tritium production with the MCNP Monte Carlo code, with 7Li neutron cross section files modified from the standard JENDL-2 cross section library, such that the tritium production reaction is separated into its secondary reaction. By comparing the results to those obtained with the HENDL-2 and ENDF/B-IV standard 7Li files the authors come to the conclusion that the shape of the spectrum of the secondary neutrons from the tritium production reaction is important to tritium breeding in lithium blankets at least as well as the magnitude of the total cross section of this reaction. a better description of the secondary neutron spectrum is enabled by the representation of the tritium production through the various mechanisms contributing to it