The University of Texas of the Permian Basin HT3R project launched a new summer research project for students. The research group’s purpose is to simulate nuclear radiation in a variety of situations, including nuclear physics experiments and the reactor core of the HT3R reactor. The students are, from left to right, top row, Matt Moore, Calvin ‘C.J.’ Hernandez,  Zach Hadel and William Mayne; front row, from left to right, Christina Lin and Sterling Satterfield. To learn more about the UTPB HT3R project, visit the Web site at www.utpb.edu/ht3r/index.htm.

a nu generation of scientists

Students ‘heat’ up summer nuclear research project

Six students from the local area and across Texas are participating in a hot new research project this summer in the UT Permian Basin HT3R offices.

HT3R, pronounced “heater,” is the acronym for the university’s proposed High-Temperature Teaching and Test Reactor Energy Research Facility that would train engineers and scientist to develop new solutions to the world’s energy problems.

As part of the summer project, professor and summer project director Steve Nelson recruited students to establish a new research group at UTPB.  The research group’s purpose is to simulate nuclear radiation in a variety of situations, including nuclear physics experiments and the reactor core of the HT3R reactor.  The summer research students are delving deeply into an advanced radiation simulation programs created at Los Alamos National Laboratory.  

The students in the research group are responsible for creating a graphical user interface in a computer program, Mathematica, to allow future students to more easily learn to control the complex radiation software and learn to simulate complex applications of nuclear radiation.  This computational capability for radiation simulation will eventually be incorporated into full engineering simulations of the HT3R reactor and its nuclear experiments as the simulation group grows.  

The growth goal of the new research group is to support increasing numbers of research students on scholarship money through the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and other sources.  This process will create a pool of graduates with experience in nuclear engineering that are desperately needed by the NRC and the American nuclear industry.

The students are UTPB junior Calvin “C.J.” Hernandez and freshman Sterling Satterfield, and four advanced high school students enrolled in the Texas Academy of Math and Science (TAMS) at the University of North Texas. TAMS students are William Mayne, Matt Moore, Christina Lin and Zach Hadel. TAMS students are gifted in math and science and live on campus at UNT. They enter this special program at TAMS by scoring highly on their Math SATs as sophomores in high school, and graduate after two years as college juniors.

For the summer, the students lived in the UTPB dorms, played video games into the wee hours and worked in the HT3R research office during the day.

“The showers here are way nicer than the showers at the dorms in Denton,” said Hadel, who originally hails from Gainesville.

Dorm life aside, the HT3R research project has given these undergraduate and high school students a taste of graduate school level research experience.

“The structure for this class is similar to a graduate level research group in that they are given a large and complex task, which they then break into smaller tasks for subgroups or individuals to work on.  The contributions of the individual members and groups are then integrated into the solution to the larger task,” Nelson said.  Students were given an introduction to the basics of radiation physics and then set to creating the interface and advancing the practical knowledge and capability of the research group.

Nelson said the students have also lived up to being treated like graduate students.

“We have had very high expectations for them, and they have done a terrific job this summer,” he added.

Nelson said he expects to have a similar group of students in the coming years as laboratory facilities are established.

“This summer project can expand to do experiments as well as expanded computational work, and this fits right into expanding the academic program for the university as well.

Last week, the students had the opportunity to learn about and discuss the nuclear power industry with Professor Sheldon Landsberger who is the Coordinator for the Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Program at the University of Texas at Austin.

To wind up their work this summer, students made presentations on their research to another very special guest, Los Alamos Chief Engineer for Advanced Reactors Thomas Marcille.

Clearly impressed with the students, their interest in physics and mathematics, and their summer work, Marcille told them that, “a nuclear reactor is as funky a physics machine as there is.”

Marcille has spent more than 20 years designing nuclear reactors, including advanced reactors used in space applications. He discussed simulation techniques, design elements, materials and mechanical properties with the students as well.