Liquid Metal-Cooled Nuclear Systems: Advanced Safety and Thermohydraulic Design Approaches

Date: 20-23 April 2026

Location: on-site: Waterloosesteenweg, 72, 1640 Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium - near Brussels

Credits: Heat flux distribution with deformed pin, Dr. Matilde Fiore.

About the lecture series

Liquid metal-cooled fast reactors (LMFRs) are central to the development of next-generation nuclear systems, offering unique advantages in sustainability, safety, and performance. Their design and deployment require a deep understanding of advanced safety features and complex thermohydraulic behavior, including natural circulation, passive decay heat removal, and transient phenomena in large pool configurations. These aspects are critical for ensuring compliance with stringent safety standards and for validating reactor performance under normal and off-normal conditions.
 
This Lecture Series aims to provide participants with a strong foundation in LMFR technology and a comprehensive overview of recent developments in safety analysis and thermohydraulic design.
Over four days, leading experts participating in the EU-funded projects ANSELMUS and LESTO will address key topics such as reactor design principles, core physics with a primary focus on thermal-hydraulics, coolant chemistry, and material challenges. These discussions will include validation processes supported by state-of-the-art experimental facilities.
Additional sessions will address Phenomena Identification and Ranking Technique (PIRT), uncertainty quantification, digital twins, and inspection strategies at high temperatures, as well as passive safety systems.
Moreover, an interactive panel on the social impact of heavy liquid metal technology will provide participants with valuable insights and practical perspectives on how safety and thermo-hydraulics together influence the future deployment of LMFRs. The session will include an open discussion with the experts.

The lecture series director is Dr. Silvania Lopes From the von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, Belgium.

Preliminary Programme

Monday 20 April 2026

08:30 - 09:00 Welcoming participants and registration

09:00 - 09:15  Welcome word and Introduction
Philippe Planquart, von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, Belgium

09:15 - 10:45 Liquid-metal-cooled-fast reactor (To be confirmed)
Gen IV reactor, Research Reactors, SMRs, Current designs, Sustainability, Safety approach

10:45 - 11:00 Coffee break

11:00 - 12:30 PIRT- Phenomena Identification and Ranking Technique (Marco Caramelo, ANSALDO ANN, Italy)
Why we need it, examples, knowledge gaps

12:30 - 13:30 Lunch

13:30 - 15:00 Core - Neutronics (To be confirmed)
Fuel cycle, MOX fuel availability, Safety and Security, Integrability

15:00 - 15:15 Coffee break

15:15 - 16:45 Social impact - Panel
Social impact of heavy metal cooled nuclear technology, Energy use, Ethical considerations

Evening: Social dinner

Tuesday 21 April 2026

09:00 - 10:30 Core Thermo-hydraulics: Operating conditions (Julio Pacio, SCK CEN, Belgium)
Objectives, Different design, Coolability, Numerics and experiments

10:30 - 10:45 Coffee break

10:45 - 12:15 Core – Thermo-hydraulics: Safety scenarios (Petrovic Dorde, SCK CEN, Belgium)

12:15 - 13:15 Lunch

13:15 - 14:45 Coolant – Chemistry (To be confirmed)
Oxygen control, fission products, polonium release, purification

14:45 - 15:00 Coffee break

15:00 - 16:30 Coolant – Material (Annette Heinzel, KIT, Germany)
LFR materials in lead at high temperatures, fretting, erosion

Wednesday 22 April 2026

09:00 - 10:30 Pool thermal-hydraulics  (Ferry Roelofs, NRG PALLAS, The Netherlands)
Design straegies, forced/natural convection, validation, scaling

10:30 - 10:45 Coffee break

10:45 - 12:15 Pool thermal-hydraulics- Future prospectives (Lilla Koloszar, VKI, Belgium)
Digital twin, future technologies

12:15 - 13:15 Lunch

13:15 - 14:45 Heat Exchanger – General (Nicola Forgione, UNIPI, Italy)
Used technologies in LFR/SMRs, experiments, modeling

14:45 - 15:00 Coffee break

15:00 - 16:30 Heat Exchanger – Steam Generator Tube Rupture (Ivan Di Piazza, ENEA, Italy)
Description of physics, modeling, experiments

Thursday 23 April 2026

09:00 - 10:30 Passive DHR (Decay Heat Removal) (Fabio Giannetti, UNIROMA, Italy)
What is passive safety? Natural circulation in LMFR, Internal systems (DHR-1), External systems (DHR-2)

10:30 - 10:45 Coffee break

10:45 - 12:15 Monitoring (To be confirmed)
Inspection strategy, inspection at high temperatures, inspection tools

12:15 - 13:15 Lunch

13:15 - 14:45 Summary  and Next challenges  (To be confirmed)

14:45 - 15:00 Coffee break

15:00 - 16:30 Visit of VKI labs

Fee and Registration

The lecture series is free for the  ANSELMUS and LESTO partners.

• Deadline for on-site registration: 6 April 2026
• Deadline for online registration: 30 March 2026
• Discount of 30% for citizens from NATO countries*

* applicable on the price listed below

Early Bird Registration until 20 February 2026

• Undergraduate students: €270
• PhD students: €720
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1368
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1728

Late Registration after 20 February 2026

• Undergraduate students: €300
• PhD students: €800
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1520
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1920

Introduction to Boundary Layer Stability and Transition Analysis Methods

Date: 02-05 March 2026

Location: on-site: Waterloosesteenweg, 72, 1640 Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium - near Brussels

About the lecture series

Flow instability analysis is crucial for identifying and understanding some of the most complex challenges in fluid mechanics. Its applications span a wide range of industrial interests, from hypersonic spacecraft and detached flows in aero-engines to aeroacoustics interactions and drag reduction in air vehicles. Nowadays, the availability of new experimental data and high- fidelity numerical solutions combined with the power of machine learning techniques has led to unprecedented opportunities for the advancement of transitional fluid dynamics understanding and its use in industrial design.

The lecture series will introduce several aspects of the stability theory with a particular focus on compressible flows. It will address numerical methods to predict and models transitional flows (linear and non-linear stability theory, transient growth or resolvent analysis). Engineering approaches to be used for design purposes will be discussed as well as the role of machine learning to compute more accurate efficient model. Finally, measurement methods and experimental techniques will be presented.

The lecture series directors are Professor Pierre Schrooyen and Professor Guillaume Grossir from the von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, Belgium.

Preliminary Programme

Monday 2 March 2026

08:30 - 09:00 Welcoming participants

09:00 - 09:30 VKI: Welcome introduction

09:30 - 11:00 Introduction to Laminar-Turbulent Transition
Prof. Neil Sandham, University of Southampton, United Kingdom

11:00 - 11:15 Coffee break

11:15 - 12:45 Boundary layer transition mechanisms in the high-speed flow regime
Dr. Olaf Marxen, University of Surrey,  United Kingdom

12:45 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:15 Boundary layer receptivity
Prof. Neil Sandham, University of Southampton, United Kingdom

15:15 - 15:30 Coffee Break

15:30 - 17:15 Visit of VKI facilities

17:15 - 18:15 Ice breaking cocktail

Tuesday 03 March 2026

09:00 - 10:30 Linear and non-linear methods for stability analysis
Mr. Stefan Hein, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Germany 

10:30 - 10:45 Coffee break

10:45 - 12:15 On transient growth
Dr. Pedro Paredes, NASA Langley Research Center, The Unites Sates of America

12:15 - 13:15 Lunch

13:15 - 14:45 High fidelity simulation for high-speed transitional flows
Prof. Paola Cinnella, Sorbonne Université, France

14:45 - 15:00 Coffee break

15:00 - 16:30 Resolvent / input-output analysis
Dr. Samir Beneddine, ONERA, France

Wednesday 4 March2026

09:00 - 10:30 RANS modeling for transitional flow
Dr.-Ing. Florian Menter, ANSYS, Germany

10:30 - 10:45 Coffee break

10:45 - 12:15 Transition Impact on High-Speed Vehicle Design: Engineering Methodologies for Transition Onset and Extent”
Dr. Johan Steelant, European Space Agency (ESA), The Netherlands

12:15 - 13:15 Lunch

13:15 - 14:45 How machine learning can be exploited to predict transition?
Dr. Pedro Paredes, NASA Langley Research Center, The Unites Sates of America

14:45 - 15:00 Coffee break

15:00 - 16:30 On the design of hypersonic quiet facilities
Prof. Guillaume Grossir, von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics (VKI), Belgium

Thursday 5 March 2026

08:45 - 10:15 Focused Laser Differential Interferometry for Hypersonic Instability Measurements
Dr. Leonardo Saenz, von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics (VKI), Belgium

10:15 - 10:30 Coffee break

10:30 - 12:00  Experimental characterization of the hypersonic boundary layer transition process
Prof. Jonathan Hill Embry-Riddle Aeroautical University (ERAU), The United States of America

12:00 - 13:00 Lunch

13:00 - 14:30 Transition experiments in a high-density tunnel
Prof. Matthew McGilvray, University of OXford, United Kingdom

14:30 - 14:45 Coffee break

14:45 - 16:15 Temperature sensitive paint
Dr. Jan Martinez Schramm, Leni Schmidt, and Divek Surujhlal, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Germany 

Fee and Registration

• Deadline for on-site registration: 16 February 2026
• Discount of 30% for citizens from NATO countries*

* applicable on the price listed below

Early Bird Registration until 30 January 2026

• Undergraduate students: €270
• PhD students: €720
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1368
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1728

Late Registration after 30 January 2026

• Undergraduate students: €300
• PhD students: €800
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1520
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1920

Large Eddy Simulation and Related Techniques 2026

Date: 8-12 June 2026

Location: online / on-site: Waterloosesteenweg, 72, 1640 Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium - near Brussels

About the lecture series

The purpose of this Lecture Series is to offer a full overview of the present development and the potential of the Large Eddy Simulation (LES) of turbulent flows. The first part of the course will introduce and discuss fundamental principles, present state-of-the-art applications. The specific numerical problems related to the implementation of LES will be also presented.

The second part will present applications of these approaches to various engineering fields of wide interest.

The course will be concluded discussing the possible developments of LES and Detached Eddy Simulation (DES) which represents the most promising technique to extend the usefulness of LES for high Reynolds-number flows.

The course will be delivered by internationally recognized experts. Its content is addressed both to researchers interested in the fundamental simulation of turbulence and engineers wanting to apply the LES technique or LES solvers to the accurate simulations of turbulent flows.

The lecture series director is Professor Ugo Piomelli from Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada. The local organizer is Professor Jeroen van Beeck from the von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, Belgium

Programme

Monday, 8 June 2026

08:30 - 09:00 Registration and Welcome Coffee

09:00 - 09:15 Welcome Address

09:15 - 10:30 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows 
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:15 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows (cont’d)
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

12:15 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:15 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows (cont’d)
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

15:15 - 15:45 Coffee Break

15:45 - 17:00 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows (cont’d)
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

17:00 - 18:00 Reception

Tuesday, 9 June 2026

09:15 - 10:30 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows 
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:15 Large Eddy and Direct Simulation of Turbulent Flows (cont’d)
Prof. Ugo Piomelli, Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada

12:15 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:15 Applications of Large Eddy Simulation and Direct Simulation to Biological Flows
Prof. Elias Balaras, The George Washington University, USA 

15:15 - 15:45 Coffee Break

15:45 - 17:00 Applications of Large Eddy Simulation and Direct Simulation to Biological Flows (cont'd)
Prof. Elias Balaras, The George Washington University, USA

17:00 End of day

Wednesday, 10 June 2026

09:15 - 10:30 Numerical Implementation of Large-Eddy Simulation
Prof. Pierre Sagaut, Laboratoire de Mécanique Modélisation et Procédés Propres, UMR CNRS 7340, Aix-Marseille Université, France

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:15 Numerical Implementation of Large-Eddy Simulation (cont’d)
Prof. Pierre Sagaut, Laboratoire de Mécanique Modélisation et Procédés Propres, UMR CNRS 7340, Aix-Marseille Université, France

12:15 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:00 Immersed Boundary Technique for Large Eddy Simulation
Prof. Roberto Verzicco, Università di Roma "Tor Vergata", Italy 

15:00 - 15:30 Coffee Break

15:30 - 16:45 Immersed Boundary Technique for Large Eddy Simulation (cont’d)
Prof. Roberto Verzicco, Università di Roma "Tor Vergata", Italy 

16:45 End of day

Thursday, 11 June 2026

09:15 - 10:30 Applications of Large Eddy Simulation to Atmospheric Flows and Wind Engineering
Prof. Johan Meyers, KULeuven, Belgium

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break 

11:00 - 12:15 Applications of Large Eddy Simulation to Atmospheric Flows and Wind Engineering (cont'd)
Prof. Johan Meyers, KULeuven, Belgium

12:15 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:00 Detached Eddy Simulation
Prof. Yannick Hoarau University of Strasbourg, France

15:00 - 16:45 Coffee Break

16:45 - 17:00 Application of Detached Eddy Simulations.
Prof. Yannick Hoarau, University of Strasbourg, France

17:00 End of the day

Friday, 12 June 2026

9:15 - 10:30 HPC requirements for LES and related techniques
Dr. Oriol Lehmkuhl, Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Spain

10:30 - 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:15 HPC requirements for LES and related techniques 
Dr. Oriol Lehmkuhl, Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Spain

12:15 - 13:45 Lunch

13:45 - 15:00 Visit of VKI laboratories

15:00 - 15:30 Coffee Break

15:30: End of Lecture Series

Fee and Registration

• Deadline for on-site registration: 25 May 2026
• Deadline for online registration: 1 June 2026

• Discount of 10% in case of online participation*
• Discount of 30% for citizens from NATO countries*

* applicable on the price listed below

Early Bird Registration until 8 April 2026

• Undergraduate students: €315
• PhD students: €864
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1368
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1728

Late Registration after 8 April 2026

• Undergraduate students: €350
• PhD students: €960
• Staff from recognized universities / research center: €1520
• Staff from commercial organizations: €1920

Introductory course to OpenFOAM® 2026

Date: 24-25 March 2026

Location: on-site: Waterloosesteenweg, 72, 1640 Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium - near Brussels

About the course

Programme

Tuesday, 24 March 2026

08:30 - 09:00 Registration

09:00 - 10:15 General introduction to OpenFOAM

10:15 - 10:45 Break

10:45 - 12:15 Tutorial on incompressible RANS simulation – Pre-processing

12:15 - 13:30 Lunch Break

13:30 - 15:00 Tutorial on incompressible RANS simulation – Simulation setup

15:00 - 15:30 Break

15:30 - 17:00 Tutorial on incompressible RANS simulation – Post-processing

17:00 End of course

Wednesday, 25 March 2026

09:00 - 10:15 Meshing with SnappyHexMesh – part 1

10:15 - 10:45 Break

10:45 - 12:15 Meshing with SnappyHexMesh – part 2

12:15 - 13:30 Lunch break

13:30 - 15:00 Tutorial on incompressible multiphase VOF solver – Simulation setup

15:00 - 15:30 Break

15:30 - 16:30 Tutorial on incompressible multiphase VOF solver – Post-processing

16:30 Open discussion

Fee and Registration

Early Bird registration until 24 January 2026

Deadline for registration: 9 March 2026

The course will take place on-site only. There is no remote option.

The price includes the course material, lunches and coffee breaks.

Cancellation fee: 30% till 1 week before, 50% later on.

NOTE: No additional material or equipment is needed for the course. The participants will receive the course note as well as have the possibility to use the workstations in the classroom. Please note, that the number of participants is limited to 10!

For further information please contact: Dr. Sivania Lopes: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Early Bird Registration until 24 January 2026

• Academy: €594
• Non-Academy: €765

Late Registration after 24 January 2026

• Academy: €660
• Non-Academy: €850