Acquiring and Installing Data for ALARA¶
Data Formats¶
ALARA uses a native binary data format to accelerate data lookup and retreival. Obviously, data is not distributed in this format and needs to be converted, a process which is done by ALARA istelf. However, ALARA only supports specific native data formats for this conversion process. (If you would like to have support for a different data format, please contact the developers <mailto:wilsonp@engr.wisc.edu>.)
In summary, ALARA supports the EAF (LIBOUT) and IEAF (GENDF) formats for transmutation data, and the ENDF format for decay and gamma source data.
EAF Format (Transmutation Data [also called LIBOUT format])
The first data format supported bu ALARA is the so-called EAF format. While EAF data itself can come in many formats, this format is meant to describe the multi-group cross-section format used by FISPACT. Here are the first 30 lines of the FENDL 2.0 Activation library with a 175 group vitamin-j structure in the EAF format.
*******************************************************************************
* FENDLA-2.0(0)175Gp THE FUSION EVALUATED NUCLEAR DATA LIBRARY APR 1996 *
*******************************************************************************
CULHAM COPY OF ACTIVATION AND TRANSMUTATION CROSS SECTION FILE FOR
FUSION REACTORS FOR USE BY EUROPEAN ACTIVATION SYSTEM (EASY)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ORIGINAL DATA SOURCE: EAF-4.1 FILE, PRODUCED BY J.KOPECKY AND D.NIEROP
STARTER FOR THIS VERSION IS EAF-4.1 (JAN 96) MAIN AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT ARE:
1) UPDATE OF REACTIONS FOLLOWING THE LIST SELECTED AT THE DEL MAR AGM MEETING
DETAILED IN INDC(NDS)-352 WITH SOURCES DATA FROM:
EAF-4.1, ADL-3, FENDL/A-1.1, IRK, CRP, ADL-3/I, AND JENDL3.2/A
2) ADDITIONAL TARGET HO-164 AND HO*-164
3) 404 REACTIONS MERGED/REPLACED IN EAF-4.1 (STOP AT CM-248)
THESE GROUP CROSS SECTIONS HAVE BEEN CALCULATED AT CULHAM IN THE 175-GROUP
VITAMIN-J STRUCTURE AND WITH THE VITAMIN-E MICRO-FLUX WEIGHTING FUNCTION.
###############################################################################
10010 1020 175 H 1 (N,G )H 2 1.0000+00*
JEF-2.2
2.67571E-05 2.74338E-05 2.77099E-05 2.82188E-05 2.89280E-05 2.92357E-05
2.95285E-05 2.97939E-05 2.99368E-05 3.00611E-05 3.03956E-05 3.06170E-05
3.11367E-05 3.15726E-05 3.19902E-05 3.23954E-05 3.27796E-05 3.31301E-05
3.34419E-05 3.37059E-05 3.39940E-05 3.44710E-05 3.49471E-05 3.52980E-05
3.54198E-05 3.55118E-05 3.56592E-05 3.58352E-05 3.60194E-05 3.61905E-05
3.63575E-05 3.63948E-05 3.63581E-05 3.62999E-05 3.61767E-05 3.59677E-05
3.58238E-05 3.57321E-05 3.55879E-05 3.53810E-05 3.51832E-05 3.49968E-05
3.48454E-05 3.47706E-05 3.47426E-05 3.47031E-05 3.46198E-05 3.44854E-05
3.43325E-05 3.42378E-05 3.42540E-05 3.42722E-05 3.42896E-05 3.43066E-05
3.43285E-05 3.43475E-05 3.43785E-05 3.44599E-05 3.44539E-05 3.44157E-05
3.44285E-05 3.44484E-05 3.44916E-05 3.45820E-05 3.46764E-05 3.47571E-05
IEAF Data (Transmutation data)
Support was added for the IEAF 2001 data in order to permit modelling of applications with neutron energies up to 150 MeV. In particular, this supports the GENDF formatted version of the IEAF data stored in file 3, section 5. The following shows two sections of the GENDF file for 1H. (Note that for processing, a single IEAF file should be created as an ordered concatenation of all the individual isotope files.
lines 1-10
1- H- 1 FZK,INPE 1 0 0 0
1.001000+4 9.991700-1 0 1 -1 17 101 1451 1
3.000000+2 .000000+0 256 0 276 0 101 1451 2
.000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 101 1451 3
.000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 101 1451 4
.000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 .000000+0 1.00000+10 101 1451 5
1.000000-5 1.000000-1 4.140000-1 5.316000-1 6.826000-1 8.764000-1 101 1451 6
1.125000+0 1.445000+0 1.855000+0 2.382000+0 3.059000+0 3.928000+0 101 1451 7
5.043000+0 6.476000+0 8.315000+0 1.068000+1 1.371000+1 1.760000+1 101 1451 8
2.260000+1 2.902000+1 3.727000+1 4.785000+1 6.144000+1 7.889000+1 101 1451 9
lines 41-60
4.800000+7 4.900000+7 5.000000+7 5.200000+7 5.400000+7 5.600000+7 101 1451 40
5.800000+7 6.000000+7 6.200000+7 6.400000+7 6.600000+7 6.800000+7 101 1451 41
7.000000+7 7.200000+7 7.400000+7 7.600000+7 7.800000+7 8.000000+7 101 1451 42
8.200000+7 8.400000+7 8.600000+7 8.800000+7 9.000000+7 9.200000+7 101 1451 43
9.400000+7 9.600000+7 9.800000+7 1.000000+8 1.020000+8 1.040000+8 101 1451 44
1.060000+8 1.080000+8 1.100000+8 1.120000+8 1.140000+8 1.160000+8 101 1451 45
1.180000+8 1.200000+8 1.220000+8 1.240000+8 1.260000+8 1.280000+8 101 1451 46
1.300000+8 1.320000+8 1.340000+8 1.360000+8 1.380000+8 1.400000+8 101 1451 47
1.420000+8 1.440000+8 1.460000+8 1.480000+8 1.500000+8 .000000+0 101 1451 48
101 0 0 49
1.001000+4 .000000+0 1 1 0 256 101 3 5 50
3.000000+2 .000000+0 2 1 2 1 101 3 5 51
9.999000-2 3.309216-1 101 3 5 52
3.000000+2 .000000+0 2 1 2 2 101 3 5 53
3.140000-1 1.101258-1 101 3 5 54
3.000000+2 .000000+0 2 1 2 3 101 3 5 55
1.176000-1 7.701200-2 101 3 5 56
3.000000+2 .000000+0 2 1 2 4 101 3 5 57
1.510000-1 6.797717-2 101 3 5 58
3.000000+2 .000000+0 2 1 2 5 101 3 5 59
ENDF Format (Decay and Gamma Data)
The only decay data format supported by ALARA is the raw ENDF-6 format. in File 8, section (MT) 457. The following shows two sections of the FENDL 2.0 Decay library in ENDF format.
lines 1-20
1 FENDL/D-2.0
BASED ON EAF-4.1 DECAY DATA LIBRARY
0.10010E+040.99141E+00 0 0 0 17500 1451 1
0.00000E+000.00000E+00 0 0 0 07500 1451 2
0.0 0.0 0 0 6 17500 1451 3
------------------------------------------------------------------7500 1451 4
1-H - 1 DECAY DATA FOR GREAC LIBRARY APRIL 1987. 7500 1451 5
## STABLE NUCLIDE ## 7500 1451 6
FILE ONLY CONTAINS NEEDED DECAY DATA, OTHER VALUES SET TO ZERO. 7500 1451 7
## STABLE NUCLIDE ## 7500 1451 8
------------------------------------------------------------------7500 1451 9
0.0 0.0 1 451 10 17500 1451 10
7500 1 0 11
7500 0 0 12
0 0 0 13
0.10020E+040.19828E+01 0 0 0 17501 1451 1
0.00000E+000.00000E+00 0 0 0 07501 1451 2
0.0 0.0 0 0 6 17501 1451 3
------------------------------------------------------------------7501 1451 4
1-H - 2 DECAY DATA FOR GREAC LIBRARY APRIL 1987. 7501 1451 5
lines 61-80
131 1451 33
ENDF/B- V DATA PRODUCED BY COGEND (A.TOBIAS JAN-1984). 131 1451 34
131 1451 35
***************************************************************** 131 1451 36
131 1451 37
THE DATA WERE COMPILED AT THE NEA DATA BANK ON 20-JUL-93 131 1451 38
USING THE CODE "CORDECAY" VERSION 1.2 131 1451 39
131 1451 40
***************************************************************** 131 1451 41
131 1451 42
1 451 44 0 131 1451 43
8 457 9 0 131 1451 44
131 1 0 45
131 0 0 46
1.003000+3 2.990140+0 0 0 0 1 131 8457 47
3.891050+8 6.311520+5 0 0 6 0 131 8457 48
5.706600+3 1.843710+0 0.000000+0 0.000000+0 0.000000+0 0.000000+0 131 8457 49
5.000000-1 1.000000+0 0 0 6 1 131 8457 50
1.000000+0 0.000000+0 1.857100+4 6.000000+0 1.000000+0 0.000000+0 131 8457 51
0.000000+0 1.000000+0 0 0 6 1 131 8457 52
Format Conversion¶
When looking up and retrieving data, ALARA uses its own binary data format exclusively. This requires coversion from the above native data formats to the ALARA v2 format. Although a problem can be setup whereby ALARA is told to use data in a native format, the implementation of this simply performs the conversion at the beginning of the run and throws away the converted library at the end. It is best to use ALARA separately to quickly create an ALARA v2 binary library and then install that library for future direct use by ALARA.
A library can be converted by simply running ALARA with an input file that contains only the convert_lib input token.
Cross-Section Installation¶
Once nuclear data has been processed into its ALARA v2 binary form, it can be installed in the default location for access by alara: prefix/lib/alara/$OSTYPE. (See the installation guide for more on the directory structure.) If not placed in this location, data is searched for either in the path defined by the environment variable $ALARA_XSDIR or in the current working directory.