Theory of Third Order Moments-Related Reactor Noise Experiments with Delayed Neutrons

Abstract

A general theory of third order moments-related reactor noise pulse experiments is presented. Detailed computation of a two-intervals moment of counts for a zero power one velocity point reactor with delayed neutrons is performed. The neutronic process is analyzed up to third order covariances via an extension of the usual mobility and diffusion matrices' approach. For this purpose, a stochastic diffusion matrix and a third order stochastic diffusion tensor are introduced. Detection effects are taken into account through a non-homogeneous Poisson distribution. No a priori approximation for the probability generating function of counts is assumed.