[2.3] A material has a neutron cross section of 3.

50 x 10-24 cm2/nuclei, and contains

4.20 x 1023 nuclei/cm3:
a. What is the macroscopic cross section?
b. What is the mean free path?
c. If neutrons impinge perpendicularly on a slab of the material, which is 3.0 cm
thick, what fraction of them will penetrate the slab without making a collision?
d. What fraction of the neutrons in part c will collide in the slab before
penetrating a distance of 1.5 cm
a.

N 3.5*10

24

b.
c.
d.

*4.2*1023 1.47cm1

1/ 0.68cm
exp(3* ) exp(1.47*3) 0.0122
1 exp( *1.5) 1 exp(1.47*1.5) 0.89

[2.7] How may parts per million of boron must be dissolved in water at room
temperature to double its absorption cross section for thermal neutrons?

We have N B aB N H2O aH2O 2 N H2O aH2O or N B / N H2O aH2O / aB

Using the

absorption cross section data from Appendix E, we have

N B / N H2O 0.5896 / 767 768 106

This would be 768 ppma, or parts per million

by atom. However, ppm is normally measured as a mass ratio. Thus since boron
has only 10.85 atomic mass units while water has 18. The ratio of masses will be
10.82
768 106 462 106 or 462 ppm
18
[2.8] What is the total macroscopic thermal cross section of uranium dioxide (UO2)
that has been enriched to 4%?

Assume 25 607.5 b , 28 11.8 b , O 3.8 b ,

and that UO2 has a density of 10.5gm/cm3.

Use Eq. (2.26) to calculate the composite microscopic cross section of the uranium:

U e 25 (1 e) 28 0.04 607.5 0.96 11.8 35.628b

The microscopic cross section of UO2 is thus

UO U 2 O 35.628 2 3.8 43.228b

2

The macroscopic cross section is

UO2

No
A

UO2

10.5 0.6023 1024

43.228 1024 1.013 cm1 where we have

238 2 16

rounded the molecular weight of the enriched uranium to 238.

[2.15] What is the minimum number of elastic scattering collisions required to slow a
neutron down from 1.0 MeV to 1.0 eV in
a. deuterium,
b. carbon-12,
c. iron-56, and
d. uranium-238?
The minimum number of collision will result if the neutron looses the maximum
amount of energy with each collision; That is From Eq. (2.46) E E . Thus we
have 1.0eV N 106 eV where N is the minimum number of collisions. Solving we
have N ln(106 ) / ln( ) 13.8 / ln( ) . Thus with ( A 1)2 /( A 1)2
a. deuterium,

0.111

ln( ) -2.20

N = 6.28

b. carbon-12,

0.716

ln( ) -0.334

N = 41.3

42

c. iron-56, and

d. uranium-238?

0.931
0.983

ln( ) -0.0714 N = 193.2

ln( ) -0.0168 N = 821.1

194

822

[3.4] For thermal neutrons calculate as a function of uranium enrichment and plot
your results. Use the uranium data from the following table:

Uranium-235
Plutonium-239
Uranium-238

2.43
2.90
---

f (barns)

a (barns)

505
698
0

591
973
2.42

We have

( N f )25
( N a ) ( N a )
25

28

25 f 25
a

25

1
1 ( N / N 25 ) a / a
28

28

25

Since the enrichment is e N 25 /( N 25 N 28 ) we have

25 f 25
1
1

2.08
25
1
28
25
a 1 (e 1) a / a
1 0.00409 (e1 1)

[3.10] A power reactor is cooled by heavy water, ( D2O) but a leak causes a 1.0
atom % contamination of the coolant with light water(H2O). Determine the resulting
percentage increase or decrease in the coolants
a. slowing down decrement
b. slowing down power
c. slowing down ratio.
All the needed data is in Table 3.1, provided we take si (i si ) / i yielding
sD2O =0.353,

sH 2O =1.38

and ai i si /(i si / ai )
aD2O 8.57 106 aH2O 0.022

For a.:

From Eq. (2.61) the averaged slowing down decrement is

1
s

si

For 1% contamination, the number densities and thus the macroscopic cross sections
of heavy water and water are replaced by 0.99 and 0.01 of their nominal values.
Thus

D O 0.99 sD O H O 0.01 sH O
2

0.99 sD2O 0.01 sH 2O

0.51 0.99 0.353 0.93 0.011.38 0.191

0.526 \
0.99 0.353 0.011.38
0.363
0.526 0.51
100% 3.13%
0.51

For b. We again use Eq. (2.61);

s 0.99 sD2O 0.01 sH 2O 0.363

s 0.363 0.526 0.191

0.191 0.18
*100% 6.08%
0.18
For c.

s / a i si / (0.99 aD O 0.01 aH O )
2

0.191
836
0.99 8.57 106 0.01 0.022

21000 836
*100% 96.0%
21000

Thus while the contamination has only small effects on the slowing down decrement
and power, it decreases the slowing down ratio substantially as a result of the much
larger absorption cross section of water.