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A non-dominated discrete differential evolution for fuel loading pattern optimization of a nuclear research reactor

  • Quang Binh Do ORCID logo EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: October 9, 2023
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Abstract

This paper presents a detailed description of a new variant of differential evolution for nuclear reactor refueling optimization problem. This variant combines the elitism strategy with a discrete differential evolution. The elitism strategy allows non-dominated solutions found during the search and stored in the archive to participate in the differential evolution operation. The population size is the same as the archive size, and the number of non-dominated solutions participating in the search at a particular generation is controlled by a specific probability. The proposed method is successfully applied to a nuclear research reactor for its first refueling time to search for optimal loading patterns that both maximize the effective multiplication keff and minimize the power peaking factor PPF of the reactor. The optimal loading patterns can significantly improve the operational time and safety of the reactor compared to the loading pattern used in practice.


Corresponding author: Quang Binh Do, Sai Gon University, 273 An Duong Vuong Street, Ho Chi Minh City, 700000, Vietnam, E-mail:

  1. Research ethics: Not applicable.

  2. Author contributions: The author has accepted responsibility for the entire content of this manuscript and approved its submission.

  3. Competing interests: The author states no conflict of interest.

  4. Research funding: This work was funded by Sai Gon University, Ho Chi Minh City, Viet Nam under grant CSA2021-17.

  5. Data availability: Not applicable.

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Received: 2023-06-11
Published Online: 2023-10-09
Published in Print: 2023-12-15

© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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