Dr. Sean Martinson

Student

Texas A&M University

MTV Students

Biography

Sean Martinson graduated from the University of Utah in 2018 with a BS in Physics and double minors in Chemistry and Nuclear Engineering. During his time in Utah, he assisted with a nuclear forensics morphological study of U-oxides under Dr. Luther McDonald. Sean is currently a PhD student majoring in Nuclear Engineering at Texas A&M University. His academic advisor Dr. Sunil Chirayath. Sean’s first graduate research project centered on determining technical parameters from research nuclear reactors that could be used in a mailbox declaration safeguards system. This project required heavy MCNP use. The project that Sean is currently engaged in focuses on nuclear forensics and nonproliferation. Sean is performing modelling and experimental analysis of irradiated LEU UO2 samples. Using MCNP, Sean will calculate certain intra-element ratios which are used in a Maximum Likelihood method for reactor-type discrimination. Following the simulation work, Sean will perform radiochemical analysis of the irradiated materials and measure the same intra-element ratios given by MCNP. The results from this study will add to a point-validation of a reactor database used for nuclear forensics and nonproliferation work.