A Theoretical Study on the Total Cross Sections of the Natural Iron Isotopes
AbstractNuclear fusion energy, as the world's primary energy source, may be among the strongest sustainable ways to replace fossil fuels. Nuclear fusion is able to supply considerable amounts of energy over millions of years. The high temperature and intensive radiation in a nuclear fusion reactor can cause damage to the structural materials. Thus, the design and structural material selection of fusion reactors are very important. Nuclear materials can be broadly categorized into nuclear fuels and structural materials. Structural materials play vital role in the economics of the nuclear power plant. Iron is obviously one of the most common elements in the structural materials in nuclear technology applications. Iron also is one of the most important materials in experimental accelerator facilities, many evaluations go beyond 20 MeV. Natural iron (natFe) and 56Fe are among the best measured materials. Many measurements exist for the natural element, as well as for the major isotopic constituent Fe-56 (91.8% of natural iron), which is the main element for steel alloys. Steel is a commonly used structural material for many nuclear applications such as reactor pressure vessels that serves as the primary containment for the nuclear fuel. We have considered minor iron isotopes Fe-54 (5.8%), Fe-57 (2.1%), and Fe-58 (0.3%). The cross sections of nuclear reactions induced by nucleons are required for the design calculations in fusion reactors and other related investigations, such as fusion, fission, accelerator-driven applications, dosimetry, and nuclear medical applications. In this study, the total cross sections values for natFe(n,tot) and 54,56-58Fe(n,tot) nuclear reactions were calculated with TALYS code and were later compared with the available experimental cross section data reported in the literature.