Differences between cross-section libraries for neutron dosimetry.

Abstract

Absorbed dose calculations depend on a consistent set of nuclear data used in simulations in computer codes. Nuclear data are stored in libraries, however, the information available about the differences in dose caused by different libraries are rare. The libraries are processed by a computer system to be able to be used by a radiation transport code. One of the systems capable of processing nuclear data is the NJOY system. The objective of this study is to evaluate the nuclear data libraries for neutrons available in the literature, and to quantify the differences in absorbed dose obtained using the libraries JENDL 4.0, JEFF 3.3.1 and ENDF/B.VII. The absorbed dose calculation was performed on a simple geometric model, as spheres, and in anthropomorphic model of the human body based on the ICRP-110 for neutron transport simulation using the MCNP5 code. The results were compared with literature data. The results obtained with cross sections from the libraries JEFF and ENDF/B.VII have shown to be identical in most cases, except for one case where the difference has exceeded 10%. The results obtained with JENDL library has shown to be considerably different in most cases comparing to other two libraries. Some differences were over 200%. The dose calculations showed differences between the libraries, which is justified by differences in the cross sections. It has been observed that the cross sections values of certain nuclides assume quite different values in different libraries. These differences in turn cause considerable differences in dose calculations.