The initial development plans for the six reactor designs, soon after the release of Generation IV International Forum (GIF) TRM in 2002, were characterized by high ambition [1]. Specifically, the sodium-cooled fast reactor (SFR) and very-high temperature reactor (VHTR) gained significant attention and were expected to reach the validation stage by the 2020s, with commercial viability projected for the 2030s. However, these projections have been unrealized because of various factors. The development of reactor designs by the GIF was supposed to be influenced by events such as the 2008 global financial crisis, 2011 Fukushima accident [2, 3], discovery of extensive shale oil reserves in the United States, and overly ambitious technological targets. Consequently, the momentum for VHTR development reduced significantly. In this context, the aims of this study were to compare and analyze the development progress of the six Gen IV reactor designs over the past 20 years, based on the GIF roadmaps published in 2002 and 2014. The primary focus was to examine the prospects for the reactor designs in relation to spent nuclear fuel burning in conjunction with small modular reactor (SMR), including molten salt reactor (MSR), which is expected to have spent nuclear fuel management potential.

Iron is an essential nutrient for mammalian cells. Most iron absorption occurs in the duodenal epithelial cells and is regulated by hepcidin, which is produced and secreted in the liver. High hepcidin levels can cause iron deficiency anemia due to iron absorption failure. Inside the cell, iron conjugates with a porphyrin ring and is placed with an iron coordinated to heme. One of the heme-binding proteins, known as progesterone receptor membrane component 1 (Pgrmc1), is a non-canonical progesterone receptor associated with diverse molecular gene regulation. Previous studies showed that Pgrmc1 is related to iron homeostasis via hepcidin; however, these mechanisms remain to be elucidated. In the present study, to investigate the role of Pgrmc1 in mammalian iron metabolism, we introduced Pgrmc1 knockout (KO) mice and performed molecular biological analyses using qPCR and western blotting. Pgrmc1 deficiency decreased Hamp mRNA expression and hepcidin protein levels. However, Pgrmc1 deficiency failed to decrease Hamp transcript expression and hepcidin protein levels in siPGRMC1-transfected HepG2 cells and primary Pgrmc1 KO hepatocytes, respectively. PGRMC1 knockdown cells revealed low HAMP mRNA levels upon cyclic AMP (cAMP) activation, suggesting that PGRMC1 promotes HAMP mRNA transcription via cAMP activation. It has been implicated that hepatic Pgrmc1 cannot control hepcidin directly; however, the internal environment caused by the lack of Pgrmc1 may potentially cause low hepcidin levels.

The nuclear fuel that melted during the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011 is still being cooled by water. In this process, contaminated water containing radioactive substances such as cesium and strontium is generated. The total amount of radioactive pollutants released by the natural environment due to the nuclear accident in Fukushima in 2011 is estimated to be 900 PBq, of which 10 to 37 PBq for cesium. Radioactive cesium (137Cs) is a potassium analog that exists in the water in the form of cations with similar daytime behavior and a small hydration radius and is recognized as a radioactive nuclide that has the greatest impact on the environment due to its long half-life (about 30 years), high solubility and diffusion coefficient, and gamma-ray emission. In this study, alginate beads were designed using Prussian blue, known as a material that selectively adsorbs cesium for removal and detection of cesium. To confirm the adsorption performance of the produced Prussian blue, immersion experiments were conducted using Cs standard solution, and MCNP simulations were performed by modeling 1L reservoir to conduct experiments using radioactive Cs in the future. An adsorption experiment was conducted with water containing standard cesium solution using alginate beads impregnated with Prussian blue. The adsorption experiment tested how much cesium of the same concentration was adsorbed over time. As a result, it was found that Prussian blue beads removed about 80% of cesium within 10-15 minutes. In addition, MCNP simulation was performed using a 1 L reservoir and a 3inch NaI detector to optimize the amount of Prussian blue. The results of comparing the efficiency according to the Prussian volume was shown. It showed that our designed system holds great promise for the cleanup and detection of radioactive cesium contaminated seawater around nuclear plants and/or after nuclear accidents. Thus, this work is expected to provide insights into the fundamental MCNP simulation based optimization of Prussian blue for cesium removal and this work based MCNP simulation will pave the way for various practical applications.

APro, a process-based total system performance assessment (TSPA) tool for a geological disposal system, has a framework for simulating the radionuclide transport affected by thermal, hydraulic, mechanical or geochemical changes occurred in the disposal system. APro aims to be applied for the TSPA to long-term (> 100,000) evolution scenarios in real-world repository having more than 10,000 boreholes. In this large-scale TSPA, it is important not only to develop a high-performance numerical approach, but also to apply an efficient post-processing approach to massive spatiotemporal data. The post-processing refers to validating numerical analysis results, analyzing and evaluating target systems through data processing or visualization. Since APro uses COMSOL interface, the postprocessing function in COMSOL can be used. However, when the data size increases due to largescale numerical analysis, the time for the COMSOL post-processing increases, resulting in a problem that the analysis and evaluation are not performed effectively. In this case, it is possible to extract necessary data using the COMSOL exporting function and importing it into an external postprocessing program for the analysis and evaluation. In this study, the efficiency of external post-processing with extracted data from COMSOL was reviewed. And, we derived a proper data extraction approach (format and structure) that can increase efficiency of external post-processing.

The radionuclide management process is a conditioning technology to reduce the burden of spent fuel management, and refers to a process that can separate and recover radionuclides having similar properties from spent fuels. In particular, through the radionuclide management process, high heat- emitting, high mobility, and high toxicity radionuclides, which have a significant impact on the performance of disposal system, are separated and managed. The performance of disposal system is closely related to properties (decay heat and radioactivity) of radioactive wastes from the radionuclide management process, and the properties are directly linked to the radionuclide separation ratio that determines the composition of radionuclides in waste flow. The Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute have derived process flow diagrams for six candidates for the radionuclide management process, weighing on feasibility among various process options that can be considered. In addition, the GoldSim model has been established to calculate the mass and properties of waste from each unit process of the radionuclides management process and to observe their time variations. In this study, the candidates for the radionuclide management process are evaluated based on the waste mass and properties by using the GoldSim model, and sensitivity analysis changing the separation ratio are performed. And the effect of changes in the separation ratio for highly sensitive radionuclides on waste management strategy is analyzed. In particular, the separation ratio for high heat-emitting radionuclides determines the period of long-term decay storage.

This study examines the impact of digital payment methods on consumer spending, highlighting adoption's moderating role. A two-phase approach, involving 741 survey participants and 166,151 customer records, reveals that digital payments increase willingness to pay and total spending compared to credit cards. Adoption plays a pivotal role, with simple payment users showing significantly higher credit card usage than non-users.

Some consumer goods containing radioactive substances are in circulation and used in everyday life. In accordance with the Nuclear Safety Act, consumer goods with radioactivity are regulated. However, since most consumer goods distributed in Korea have no information that can confirm the amount of radiation, it is necessary to analyze the radiation for safety regulation. Among these consumer goods, GTLS (Gaseous Tritium Light Source) contains gaseous tritium (tritium, written as 3H or T), which is a radioactive material. The gaseous composition ratio in GTLS was analyzed using a precision gas mass spectrometer (Thermo Fisher, model MAT 271). As a result of GTLS analysis, the H2, HD or H3 +(T) or 3He, HT or D2 or He, DT, and T2, which correspond to the mass-to-charge ratio (m/z) 2 to 6 and the air components were detected. In addition, substances corresponding to m/z=24 and m/z=21 were also detected. These were compared with pure CH4 and those fragmentation patterns. The ratios of CT4 (m/z = 24) to CT3 (m/z = 21) and CH4 (m/z = 16) to CH3 (m/z = 15) were compared and they agree within the measurement uncertainty. We also performed additional experiments to separate the water component in the GTLS samples, considering the possibility that the m/z = 21 to m/z = 24 region is tritium compounds based on H2O. Despite the removal of the water components, peaks were detected at m/z=21 and m/z=24. Therefore, we confirmed that the component of m/z = 24 in the GTLS sample was CT4.

The most important thing in development of a process-based TSPA (Total System Performance Assessment) tool for large-scale disposal systems (like APro) is to use efficient numerical analysis methods for the large-scale problems. When analyzing the borehole in which the most diverse physical phenomena occur in connection with each other, the finest mesh in the system is applied to increase the analysis accuracy. Since thousands of such boreholes would be placed in the future disposal system, the numerical analysis for the system becomes significantly slower, or even impossible due to the memory problem in cases. In this study, we propose a tractable approach, so called global-local iterative analysis method, to solve the large-scale process-based TSPA problem numerically. The global-local iterative analysis method goes through the following process: 1) By applying a coarse mesh to the borehole area the size of the problem of global domain (entire disposal system) is reduced and the numerical analysis is performed for the global domain. 2) Solutions in previous step are used as a boundary condition of the problem of local domain (a unit space containing one borehole and little part of rock), the fine mesh is applied to the borehole area, and the numerical analysis is performed for each local domain. 3) Solutions in previous step are used as boundary conditions of boreholes in the problem of global domain and the numerical analysis is performed for the global domain. 4) steps 2) and 3) are repeated. The solution derived by the global-local iterative analysis method is expected to be closer to the solution derived by the numerical analysis of the global problem applying the fine mesh to boreholes. In addition, since local problems become independent problems the parallel computing can be introduced to increase calculation efficiency. This study analyzes the numerical error of the globallocal iterative analysis method and evaluates the number of iterations in which the solution satisfies the convergence criteria. And increasing computational efficiency from the parallel computing using HPC system is also analyzed.

Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute is developing a radionuclide management processes as a conditioning technology to reduce the burden of spent fuel disposal. The radionuclide management process refers to a process managing radionuclides with similar properties by introducing various technology options that can separate and recover radionuclides from spent fuels. In particular, it is a process aimed at increasing disposal efficiency by managing high-heat, high-mobility, and high-toxic radionuclides that can greatly affect the performance of the disposal system. Since the radionuclide management process seeks to consider various technology options for each unit process, it may have several process flows rather than have a single process flow. Describing the various process flows as a single flow network model is called the superstructure model. In this study, we intend to develop a superstructure model for the radionuclide management process and use it as a model to select the optimal process flow. To find the optimal process flow, an objective function must be defined, and at the fuel cycle system level multiple objectives such as effectiveness (disposal area), safety (explosure dose), and economics (cost) can be considered. Before performing the system-level optimization, it is necessary to select candidates of process flow in consideration of waste properties and process efficiency at the process level. In this study, a sensitivity analysis is conducted to analyze changes in waste properties such as decay heat and radioactivity when the separation ratio varies due to the performance change for each unit process of the radionuclide management process. Through this analysis, it is possible to derive a performance range that can have waste properties suitable for following waste treatment, especially waste form manufacturing. It is also possible to analyze the effect of waste properties that vary according to the performance change on waste storage and management approaches.

The depth of geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste (HLW) varies from country to country, but it is generally considered below 300 m underground. As one of the reliable methods to understand the geological characteristics of these deep areas, the site investigation through drilling is recommended. This paper deals with multidisciplinary research that evaluates the geological characteristics of the site using deep drilling. The deep drilling is 750 m, which is higher than the planned disposal depth. Prior to drilling, literature and surface geological surveys of the target area were conducted, and during drilling, real-time measurement of excavated information for obtaining drilling information, circulating water management and chemical composition through a closed system were monitored. After drilling, field tests such as geophysical borehole logging, deep groundwater sampling, constant pressure injection test, and hydraulic fracturing test were performed. Analysis of the recovered drilling core from a geological point of view such as age dating, rock formation and structural geological analysis, and from geochemical perspectives such as concentration of major/ minor cationic elements, major anions, and trace elements along with the water quality parameters pH, DO, Ec, Eh, etc., from geothermal perspective such as thermal conductivity and coefficient of thermal expansion, from rock mechanical aspects such as physical and mechanical properties of intact rocks and joints, joint distribution, etc. Deep drilling has been completed with 2 holes for granite and 2 holes for sedimentary rocks, and further drilling for gneiss and sedimentary rocks is in progress.

APro, developed by KAERI as a process-based total system performance assessment model, can simulate the radionuclide transport affected by thermal, hydraulic, mechanical and geochemical changes that may occurs in the engineering and natural barriers of a geological disposal system. APro targets a large-scale and heterogeneous 3D system that includes more than 10,000 boreholes located about 500 m underground and hundreds of fractures of different sizes distributed within an area of several km2. Simulating transport and reaction phenomena for such a system through the global implicit approach (GIA) may require considerable computational resources or be intractable in some cases. Therefore, APro adopts the sequential non-iterative approach (SNIA), one of the operator splitting (OS) methods, to separate the mass transport and reaction phenomena into independent problems. By using SNIA, the parallel computation performance in APro with multiple cores is expected to be improved. In this study, the effect of SNIA on the parallel computation performance was analyzed through a simple 1D reactive transport problem. Without SNIA, finite difference equations, discretized from the partial differential equations (PDEs) describing the reactive transport problem, have to be solved at once because all dependent variables are nonlinearly and spatially interconnected through reaction and mass transport terms. When the reaction and mass transport terms are separated through SNIA, the mass transport problem can be converted into independent linear equations for each chemical and the efficient linear system solver can be applied to each linear equation. In particular, since the reaction problem is changed to independent nonlinear equations for each node, the parallel computation performance can be greatly improved. To verify this, the 1D reactive transport problem was implemented in MATLAB, and SNIA and GIA were applied to solve the problem. As a result, there was no significant difference in results between SNIA and GIA for proper spatial and temporal discretization, which verified the accuracy of SNIA. In order to see the parallel computation performance, the calculation times for SNIA and GIA with increasing number of cores were measured and compared. As the number of cores increased, the SNIA calculation speed became faster than that of GIA, which verified that SNIA could improve parallel computation performance in APro. In the future, the effect of SNIA on the parallel computation performance will be verified for the numerical analysis of large-scale geological disposal systems.