Teaching
NUCE 2014: Nuclear Operations and Safety
Term: Spring 2025
A nuclear power plant differs from conventional power plants in using nuclear fission to provide the heat used to generate steam that drives an electric turbine generator. This abundant, renewable, and unique power source has many benefits, as well as unique characteristics that necessitate special attention to safety in design, licensing, and operation.
Our first responsibility is to understand the fundamental physics governing the plant processes – nuclear fission and core kinetics, criticality, radiation physics, feedback mechanisms, and accident progression that are not seen in a fossil, solar, wind, or other power system.
In this course, we will become familiar with these processes, methods for calculating some of their key features, and the relationship of those features to normal and off-normal plant operations, up to and including severe accidents.
Two approaches to nuclear safety evaluation will be discussed:
- Deterministic calculation, in which a phenomenon is analyzed according to fixed assumptions, using mathematical techniques focused on that purpose, and
- Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) that considers the spectrum of possible accident scenarios and plant responses using systems modeling and statistical methods.
The main course topics include:
- Key Principles and Evolution of Nuclear Safety
- Review of Nuclear Physics and Neutron Reactions
- Nuclear Fission Systems and Criticality Safety
- Reactor Reactivity Control
- Reactor Accident Phenomenology
- Radiation Protection
- Offsite Accident Impacts
- Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA)
- Operations and Safety of Advanced Reactors
We are also building a new course on Risk and Reliability Analysis, which will launch in 2025. Below is an overview of the planned content.
Course Title (Tentative): Risk and Reliability Analysis for Engineering Systems
Term: Spring 2026 (planned)
Objective:
This course equips upper-level undergraduate and graduate students with unique knowledge and skills to analyze and design complex engineering systems. By integrating micro-level modeling for underlying phenomena — such as fluid mechanics, material science, structural mechanics, and control systems — with macro-level systems modeling, students will learn how to approach risk and reliability problems.
Main Topics Covered:
- Review of probability and statistics
- Systematic risk modeling
- Hardware and digital component reliability modeling
- Human reliability analysis
- Uncertainty quantification
- Integration of engineering simulations with systems risk models
Course Structure:
The course combines lectures and term projects to ensure students have opportunities to apply the fundamental methods and techniques learned in class. Through hands-on projects, students will engage with real-world scenarios and practice applying risk and reliability analysis to complex engineering problems.
Why Take This Course?
This course will provide students with the critical skills needed for analyzing and designing large-scale, complex engineering systems, which are common in various sectors like energy, aerospace, and manufacturing. Students will learn how to integrate multiple modeling and simulation methods, addressing a wide range of time horizons and spatial scales. Moreover, they will gain the ability to tackle uncertainties that arise from combining diverse sources of data and information to understand different aspects of complex systems—an essential capability when working on cutting-edge projects in these industries. Whether in academic research or industry settings, these competencies are highly sought and valued.