Nuclear theory based cross sections of 232Th, 233Th, and 233U and their applications in reactor technology

Because of various reasons thorium has not found much favor with the reactor technologists and therefore its cross sections have not been studied with the desired accuracy. Cross sections make their impact on reactor design right from its inception to its completion and therefore a coherent study of the cross sections of thorium and 233U has been made. In reactor physics studies emphasis is placed on total, fission, capture, elastic and inelastic scattering cross sections. Generally, the measured information on inelastic scattering cross section of heavy nuclides is not sufficient in the MeV energy range for reactor applications. In order to correctly predict the neutron spectrum and its effect on reactor parameters the inelastic cross sections have been evaluated with the local optical and statistical models. The total and elastic scattering cross sections have also been evaluated together with the angular distributions of elastically and inelastically scattered neutrons. Multigroup temperature dependent cross sections have also been generated for thorium and 233U in the entire energy range extending up to 10 MeV