ANSWERS
Software Service
Our Mission
The ANSWERS Software Service supplies high quality software and consultancy services for customers world-wide in the areas of reactor physics, radiation shielding, dosimetry, nuclear criticality, well logging and nuclear data. Established software packages, dedicated helpline and support services, and the availability of experienced consultants and analysts provide a comprehensive capability to solve customer problems in areas such as nuclear safety, plant performance and operational efficiency.
Quality Assurance
ANSWERS management processes ensure customer requirements are met through planning, execution, review and documentation in a consistent manner suitable for audit. Our business management arrangements have been assessed and approved by Lloyd's Register Quality Assurance against the requirements of BS EN ISO 9001:2008 and an approval certificate has been awarded. A copy of this certificate is available on request.
Validation
Validation is of prime importance to all ANSWERS products and we maintain dedicated validation databases for each of our three key areas:
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For criticality assessments, our MONK validation database draws heavily from experiments features in the International Criticality Safety Benchmark Evaluation Project (ICSBEP) handbook.
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For shielding and dosimetry, our MCBEND validation database covers many of the materials and geometries that are encountered in the nuclear industry and is subject to ongoing review and enhancement.
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For reactor physics, WIMS is validated against a wide range of reactor systems and this is kept up to date through our strong involvement in the latest international benchmarks on Gen III+, Gen IV / SMR / AMR designs.
For further details on validation for each of our codes, please contact the ANSWERS Hotline.
News
MiNSE Conference
Paul Smith and Sam MacPherson attended the Modelling in Nuclear Science and Engineering 2025 conference. This is what Paul had to say "Last week we had a great time at the UK Nuclear Institute’s 8th annual conference on Modelling in Nuclear Science and Engineering, held in London on 6-7 November.
This was attended by 100 scientists and engineers from a wide range of organisations and from as far afield as Japan. It covered a wide range of topics including: #AI, foundational surrogates, reactor performance and safety, chemical and fuel cycle facilities, accident analysis, thermal-hydraulics, fuel performance, #neutronics, #criticality,
#shielding, #optimisation, energy systems, experimental techniques and theoretical modelling. I chaired a session on Multi-physics and Multi-scale Modelling, subjects dear
to my heart.
I also gave a presentation on the use of data assimilation to reduce uncertainty in calculated results, thus freeing up extra margin to allow better optimisation of plant design and operation. Sam presented a poster on Investigations into Energy Group Schemes for Reactor Physics Calculations; this will be key to the success of the wide variety of #AMR reactor types that are being developed. We sponsored the evening reception at which Sam and I demonstrated #ANSWERS software for reactor physics, criticality, shielding and dosimetry.
We have had very positive feedback from the event including useful suggestions for future events. Key amongst these is that the event has become so large that we will almost certainly need to run parallel sessions next year. We have already started planning for next year’s event, that will be held in Manchester, in the first
half of November.
Thank you Paul. For further information on the ANSWERS Software codes and their capabilities, please get in touch.
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Customer Focus
Recently we asked our #ANSWERS #MCBEND
customers a few questions on their experience using our radiation shielding software to perform parallel calculations, the use of our
CAD import capability, and the range of
particles MCBEND can model.
We received lots of helpful and detailed responses which our development team have discussed and are now planning how we can further improve these features in future code releases. Thank you to all our Amentum UK and International customers for taking the time to tell us what you think – customer-driven development is at the heart of how we develop our codes at ANSWERS.
Hole Geometry
Did you know that the “Hole Geometry” package in the ANSWERS Monte Carlo codes MONK® and MCBEND® provides a unique and powerful geometry modelling capability, utilizing Woodcock tracking to free it from the usual constraints associated with the ways in which geometry needs to be modelled in conventional surface tracking?
But Hole Geometry is not simply a way to achieve Woodcock tracking; we have Woodcock tracking so that we can have Hole Geometry.
There are around thirty generic Hole types,
each of which can be customized to produce
the desired specific geometry. These can:
model geometries which would be impossible or inefficient to model with conventional surface tracking, including a wide range of stochastic geometries; and provide a convenient alternative input syntax for common
replicating geometries.
Hole Geometries can be placed anywhere in a MONK or MCBEND model where a conventional material can be used, including in any zone of the CSG-based Fractal Geometry model, and even as subsidiary Holes within other Hole Geometries. Hole Geometry is complementary
to Fractal Geometry, and the two geometry packages are used together to easily produce sophisticated geometry models which freely mix Woodcock tracking and conventional surface tracking. Native tracking in CAD geometries provides the third component of the
geometry offering.
The combination of Fractal Geometry,
Hole Geometry and CAD import results in an incredibly powerful and easy to use geometry modelling capability which is unrivalled by any other Monte Carlo code.
