Integrated Multiple Effects Software for Nuclear Physics Applications

The design, analysis, and computer modeling of hardware for nuclear physics accelerators is a complex process, usually involving different software for different physical aspects of the same hardware. For example, electromagnetic modeling of RF sources, waveguides, couplers, and cavities is handled by one piece of software, while heat load analysis of the same components is handled by completely different software. The use of separate software tools for modeling the same hardware has a number of disadvantages: (1) duplicative efforts in terms of specifying the same hardware in different software packages, (2) difficulties in moving data from one package to another, and (3) reduced overall speed of the design cycle. This project will extend a leading electromagnetic particle simulation code, VORPAL, by adding a thermal and temperature analysis capability. In Phase I, a prototype thermal analysis capability was demonstrated and benchmarked in one and two dimensions, a new capability to treat non-linear material properties was added, and various boundary treatments were demonstrated. In Phase II, the thermal analysis capability will be realized for arbitrarily complicated geometries, the user interface will be refined to improve usability, and the computational algorithms will be optimized to assure fast and effective operation of the software. Commercial Applications and other Benefits as described by the awardee: The new thermal capability in the VORPAL software should have an immediate commercial market in the RF, accelerator, and microwave industries. Virtually any high-power RF application has thermal design constraints which will be addressable with this new technology