High-Temperature Reactor
high-temperature reactor
[′hī ‚tem·prə·chər rē′ak·tər]High-Temperature Reactor
a power nuclear reactor whose temperatures in the active region reach as high as 700° C. The term is somewhat arbitrary because any modern power reactor is essentially a high-temperature one. Usually it is called a graphite-modulated gas-cooled reactor. The development of high-temperature reactors is a promising trend in power reactor design which makes it possible, in principle, to create a reactor with a direct cycle—that is, one that operates directly with a gas turbine.