openmc.Surface

class openmc.Surface(surface_id=None, boundary_type='transmission', albedo=1.0, name='')[source]

An implicit surface with an associated boundary condition.

An implicit surface is defined as the set of zeros of a function of the three Cartesian coordinates. Surfaces in OpenMC are limited to a set of algebraic surfaces, i.e., surfaces that are polynomial in x, y, and z.

Parameters
  • surface_id (int, optional) – Unique identifier for the surface. If not specified, an identifier will automatically be assigned.

  • boundary_type ({'transmission, 'vacuum', 'reflective', 'periodic', 'white'}, optional) – Boundary condition that defines the behavior for particles hitting the surface. Defaults to transmissive boundary condition where particles freely pass through the surface. Note that periodic boundary conditions can only be applied to x-, y-, and z-planes, and only axis-aligned periodicity is supported.

  • albedo (float, optional) – Albedo of the surfaces as a ratio of particle weight after interaction with the surface to the initial weight. Values must be positive. Only applicable if the boundary type is ‘reflective’, ‘periodic’, or ‘white’.

  • name (str, optional) – Name of the surface. If not specified, the name will be the empty string.

Variables
  • boundary_type ({'transmission, 'vacuum', 'reflective', 'periodic', 'white'}) – Boundary condition that defines the behavior for particles hitting the surface.

  • albedo (float) – Boundary albedo as a positive multiplier of particle weight

  • coefficients (dict) – Dictionary of surface coefficients

  • id (int) – Unique identifier for the surface

  • name (str) – Name of the surface

  • type (str) – Type of the surface

bounding_box(side)[source]

Determine an axis-aligned bounding box.

An axis-aligned bounding box for surface half-spaces is represented by its lower-left and upper-right coordinates. If the half-space is unbounded in a particular direction, numpy.inf is used to represent infinity.

Parameters

side ({'+', '-'}) – Indicates the negative or positive half-space

Returns

  • numpy.ndarray – Lower-left coordinates of the axis-aligned bounding box for the desired half-space

  • numpy.ndarray – Upper-right coordinates of the axis-aligned bounding box for the desired half-space

clone(memo=None)[source]

Create a copy of this surface with a new unique ID.

Parameters

memo (dict or None) – A nested dictionary of previously cloned objects. This parameter is used internally and should not be specified by the user.

Returns

clone – The clone of this surface

Return type

openmc.Surface

abstract evaluate(point)[source]

Evaluate the surface equation at a given point.

Parameters

point (3-tuple of float) – The Cartesian coordinates, \((x',y',z')\), at which the surface equation should be evaluated.

Returns

Evaluation of the surface polynomial at point \((x',y',z')\)

Return type

float

static from_hdf5(group)[source]

Create surface from HDF5 group

Parameters

group (h5py.Group) – Group in HDF5 file

Returns

Instance of surface subclass

Return type

openmc.Surface

static from_xml_element(elem)[source]

Generate surface from an XML element

Parameters

elem (lxml.etree._Element) – XML element

Returns

Instance of a surface subclass

Return type

openmc.Surface

is_equal(other)[source]

Determine if this Surface is equivalent to another

Parameters

other (instance of openmc.Surface) – Instance of openmc.Surface that should be compared to the current surface

normalize(coeffs=None)[source]

Normalize coefficients by first nonzero value

New in version 0.12.

Parameters

coeffs (tuple, optional) – Tuple of surface coefficients to normalize. Defaults to None. If no coefficients are supplied then the coefficients will be taken from the current Surface.

Return type

tuple of normalized coefficients

abstract rotate(rotation, pivot=(0.0, 0.0, 0.0), order='xyz', inplace=False)[source]

Rotate surface by angles provided or by applying matrix directly.

New in version 0.12.

Parameters
  • rotation (3-tuple of float, or 3x3 iterable) – A 3-tuple of angles \((\phi, \theta, \psi)\) in degrees where the first element is the rotation about the x-axis in the fixed laboratory frame, the second element is the rotation about the y-axis in the fixed laboratory frame, and the third element is the rotation about the z-axis in the fixed laboratory frame. The rotations are active rotations. Additionally a 3x3 rotation matrix can be specified directly either as a nested iterable or array.

  • pivot (iterable of float, optional) – (x, y, z) coordinates for the point to rotate about. Defaults to (0., 0., 0.)

  • order (str, optional) – A string of ‘x’, ‘y’, and ‘z’ in some order specifying which rotation to perform first, second, and third. Defaults to ‘xyz’ which means, the rotation by angle \(\phi\) about x will be applied first, followed by \(\theta\) about y and then \(\psi\) about z. This corresponds to an x-y-z extrinsic rotation as well as a z-y’-x’’ intrinsic rotation using Tait-Bryan angles \((\phi, \theta, \psi)\).

  • inplace (bool) – Whether or not to return a new instance of Surface or to modify the coefficients of this Surface in place. Defaults to False.

Returns

Rotated surface

Return type

openmc.Surface

to_xml_element()[source]

Return XML representation of the surface

Returns

element – XML element containing source data

Return type

lxml.etree._Element

abstract translate(vector, inplace=False)[source]

Translate surface in given direction

Parameters
  • vector (iterable of float) – Direction in which surface should be translated

  • inplace (bool) – Whether or not to return a new instance of this Surface or to modify the coefficients of this Surface.

Returns

Translated surface

Return type

instance of openmc.Surface