Modelization of physical phenomena in research reactors with the help of new developments in transport methods, and methodology validation with experimental data

The aim of this work is to develop a scheme for experimental reactors, based on transport equations. This type of reactors is characterized by a small core, a complex, very heterogeneous geometry and a large leakage. The possible insertion of neutron beams in the reflector and the presence of absorbers in the core increase the difficulty of the 3D-geometrical description and the physical modeling of the component parameters of the reactor. The Orphee reactor has been chosen for our study. Physical models (homogenization, collapsing cross section in few groups, albedo multigroup condition) have been developed in the APOLLO2 and CRONOS2 codes to calculate flux and power maps in a 3D-geometry, with different burnup and through transport equations. Comparisons with experimental measurements have shown the interest of taking into account anisotropy, steep flux gradients by using Sn methods, and on the other hand using a 12-group cross section library. The modeling of neutron beams has been done outside the core modeling through Monte Carlo calculations and with the total geometry, including a large thickness of heavy water. Thanks to this calculations, one can evaluate the neutron beams anti-reactivity and determinate the core cycle. We assure these methods more accurate than usual transport-diffusion calculations will be used for the conception of new research reactors. (author)