Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism

Small modular reactors are progressing towards greater levels of automation and intelligence, with intelligent control emerging as a pivotal trend in SMR development. When contrasted with traditional commercial nuclear power plants, SMR display substantial disparities in design parameters and the de...

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Main Authors: Sicong Wan, Jichong Lei
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-07-01
Series:Energies
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18/14/3621
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author Sicong Wan
Jichong Lei
author_facet Sicong Wan
Jichong Lei
author_sort Sicong Wan
collection DOAJ
description Small modular reactors are progressing towards greater levels of automation and intelligence, with intelligent control emerging as a pivotal trend in SMR development. When contrasted with traditional commercial nuclear power plants, SMR display substantial disparities in design parameters and the designs of safety auxiliary systems. As a result, fault diagnosis systems tailored for commercial nuclear power plants are ill-equipped for SMRs. This study utilizes the PCTRAN-SMR V1.0 software to develop an intelligent fault diagnosis system for the SMART small modular reactor based on an attention mechanism. By comparing different network models, it is demonstrated that the CNN–LSTM–Attention model with an attention mechanism significantly outperforms CNN, LSTM, and CNN–LSTM models, achieving up to a 7% improvement in prediction accuracy. These results clearly indicate that incorporating an attention mechanism can effectively enhance the performance of deep learning models in nuclear power plant fault diagnosis.
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series Energies
spelling doaj-art-70104cf1132844fd843e4da8d7a6f57b2025-08-20T02:45:55ZengMDPI AGEnergies1996-10732025-07-011814362110.3390/en18143621Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention MechanismSicong Wan0Jichong Lei1College of Safety Science and Engineering, Xi’an University of Science and Technology, Xi’an 710699, ChinaSchool of Safe and Management Engineering, Hunan Institute of Technology, Hengyang 421002, ChinaSmall modular reactors are progressing towards greater levels of automation and intelligence, with intelligent control emerging as a pivotal trend in SMR development. When contrasted with traditional commercial nuclear power plants, SMR display substantial disparities in design parameters and the designs of safety auxiliary systems. As a result, fault diagnosis systems tailored for commercial nuclear power plants are ill-equipped for SMRs. This study utilizes the PCTRAN-SMR V1.0 software to develop an intelligent fault diagnosis system for the SMART small modular reactor based on an attention mechanism. By comparing different network models, it is demonstrated that the CNN–LSTM–Attention model with an attention mechanism significantly outperforms CNN, LSTM, and CNN–LSTM models, achieving up to a 7% improvement in prediction accuracy. These results clearly indicate that incorporating an attention mechanism can effectively enhance the performance of deep learning models in nuclear power plant fault diagnosis.https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18/14/3621fault diagnosisCNNLSTMCNN–LSTMCNN–LSTM–AttentionPACTRAN-SMR
spellingShingle Sicong Wan
Jichong Lei
Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
Energies
fault diagnosis
CNN
LSTM
CNN–LSTM
CNN–LSTM–Attention
PACTRAN-SMR
title Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
title_full Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
title_fullStr Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
title_full_unstemmed Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
title_short Research on a Small Modular Reactor Fault Diagnosis System Based on the Attention Mechanism
title_sort research on a small modular reactor fault diagnosis system based on the attention mechanism
topic fault diagnosis
CNN
LSTM
CNN–LSTM
CNN–LSTM–Attention
PACTRAN-SMR
url https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/18/14/3621
work_keys_str_mv AT sicongwan researchonasmallmodularreactorfaultdiagnosissystembasedontheattentionmechanism
AT jichonglei researchonasmallmodularreactorfaultdiagnosissystembasedontheattentionmechanism