A CAMAC-based reactivity-meter for nuclear reactors

Abstract A CAMAC-based reactivity-meter has been developed and implemented for continuous, real-time reactivity monitoring in nuclear reactors. The reactivity-meter comprizes two main parts. The first part is CAMAC hardware and software for fast data acquisition, while the second part is high level, i.e. FORTRAN, real-time programming for the computation of reactivity. Although the system involves a main computer for both controlling the CAMAC system and real-time computation, the complete reactivity-meter can be cast into a microprocessor-based intelligent CAMAC module as a satellite of the main computer so that the reactivity-meter would have the advantage of being software programmable rather than a hardware-designed analog or digital conventional instrument.