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2026 Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
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What’s the most difficult question you’ve been asked as a maintenance instructor?
Blye Widmar
"Where are the prints?!"
This was the final question in an onslaught of verbal feedback, comments, and critiques I received from my students back in 2019. I had two years of instructor experience and was teaching a class that had been meticulously rehearsed in preparation for an accreditation visit. I knew the training material well and transferred that knowledge effectively enough for all the students to pass the class. As we wrapped up, I asked the students how they felt about my first big system-level class, and they did not hold back.
“Why was the exam from memory when we don’t work from memory in the plant?” “Why didn’t we refer to the vendor documents?” “Why didn’t we practice more on the mock-up?” And so on.
Timothy P. Burke, Brian C. Kiedrowski
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 189 | Number 3 | March 2018 | Pages 199-223
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/00295639.2017.1388093
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Monte Carlo methods are developed using adjoint-based perturbation theory and the differential operator method to compute the sensitivities of the k-eigenvalue, linear functions of the flux (reaction rates), and bilinear functions of the forward and adjoint flux (kinetics parameters) to system dimensions for uniform expansions or contractions. The calculation of sensitivities to system dimensions requires computing scattering and fission sources at material interfaces using collisions occurring at the interface—which is a set of events with infinitesimal probability. Kernel density estimators are used to estimate the source at interfaces using collisions occurring near the interface. The methods for computing sensitivities of linear and bilinear ratios are derived using the differential operator method and adjoint-based perturbation theory and are shown to be equivalent to methods previously developed using a collision history–based approach. The methods for determining sensitivities to system dimensions are tested on a series of fast, intermediate, and thermal critical benchmarks as well as a pressurized water reactor benchmark problem with iterated fission probability used for adjoint-weighting. The estimators are shown to agree within 5% and of reference solutions obtained using direct perturbations with central differences for the majority of test problems.