LAUSR

Nuclear research reactors are used to test efficiency and safety of new technology, such as material or fuel samples under prototypic commercial conditions, operation of reactor prototypes, safety studies, assessment of neutron parameters, etc. Many experiments performed in research reactors require in-situ measurements to monitor the progress and performance of conducted tests. The core of any nuclear reactor presents a particularly harsh environment for sensors and instrumentations. The reactor core also imposes challenging constraints on signal transmission from inside the reactor core to outside of the reactor vessel. In this paper, an acoustic measurement infrastructure (AMI) installed at the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR), located at Idaho National Laboratory, is presented. The AMI consists of ATR in-pile structural components, coolant, acoustic receivers, primary coolant pumps, a data-acquisition system, and signal processing algorithms. Intrinsic and cyclic acoustic signals generated by the operation...