Assessment of New Evaluated Atomic Data Libraries in ENDF/B-VIII.0

Evaluated data libraries for electron-photon transport are most important components in Monte Carlo simulation and have been used in general-purpose Monte Carlo codes for decades. A new version of evaluated atomic data libraries, called EPICS2017, was released in early 2018. This paper reports an extensive assessment of EPICS2017, focused on what has changed, and evaluates the impact of using the new libraries in a Monte Carlo simulation environment. The results provide guidelines for developers and users of Monte Carlo codes wishing to use the new libraries. In addition, they also highlight opportunities for improving the data libraries in future releases.