Neutronic and thermal-hydraulic analysis of fission molybdenum-99 production at Tehran Research Reactor using LEU plate targets

摘要

Efficient and safe production of molybdenum-99 (Mo-99) radiopharmaceutical at Tehran Research Reactor (TRR) via fission of LEU targets is studied. Neutronic calculations are performed to evaluate produced Mo-99 activity, core neutronic safety parameters and also the power deposition values in target plates during a 7 days irradiation interval. Thermal-hydraulic analysis has been also carried out to obtain thermal behavior of these plates. Using Thermal-hydraulic analysis, it can be concluded that the safety parameters are satisfied in the current study. Consequently, the present neutronic and thermal-hydraulic calculations show efficient Mo-99 production is accessible at significant activity values in TRR current core configuration.