en.Wedoany.com Reported - Lancaster University in the UK has launched LUNOS, a nuclear facility control room simulator, which, with its highly reconfigurable architecture, is the first of its kind in the UK, providing students with a high-fidelity, deeply immersive learning experience covering multiple disciplines including nuclear engineering and cybersecurity.
The Lancaster University Nuclear Operations Simulator (LUNOS) cost £2 million ($2.69 million) and was funded by the UK Office for Students. The simulator supports multi-reactor fission and fusion modeling, capable of simulating various types including Pressurized Water Reactors (PWRs), Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), and Tokamak fusion reactors. Its software is built on industry-level source code from organizations such as Westinghouse, GSE Solutions, Tokamak Energy, and the Institute for Energy Technology in Norway.
The physical space of the simulator is constructed to resemble a real operational environment, featuring a wrap-around display composed of three immersive screens for a plant-wide overview. Students can move furniture and consoles to match different control room layouts, with digital operator workstations consistent with modern control room frameworks.
The simulator serves multiple academic and national strategic objectives. In the field of cybersecurity, it provides high-fidelity scenarios simulating cyberattacks on nuclear facilities, training professionals to protect critical national infrastructure. In nuclear engineering, it allows undergraduate, master's, and doctoral students to put theoretical concepts into practice. In human factors and psychology research, the university's Psychology Department uses the facility to study human behavior, safety protocols, and group decision-making under high-pressure emergency conditions. The facility is also equipped with an advanced session replay system that integrates audio, video, screen captures, data logs, and instructor-induced faults into a single replay file for in-depth post-analysis.
Located on the main campus, adjacent to the Data Immersion Suite, the facility will officially welcome its first students in the autumn semester.
Professor Rebecca Lingwood, Vice-Chancellor of Lancaster University, stated that this new facility will enhance Lancaster's strengths in disciplines such as nuclear engineering and cybersecurity, providing students with an excellent learning experience and helping to cultivate a younger generation that supports the low-carbon energy industry and the regional economy.
Lancaster University is one of the first UK institutions to be certified as an Academic Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Research and Education by the UK National Cyber Security Centre. The university also offers the UK's only Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) degree in Nuclear Engineering, with its nuclear science and technology research group encompassing expertise in fission and fusion fuel cycles, nuclear medicine, nuclear safety, and security.
Professor Paul Smith, Professor of Cyber Security and Principal Investigator of the project, noted that this high-fidelity simulator will create scenarios of cyberattacks on nuclear facilities, providing cybersecurity students with a deep learning experience and helping to train professionals to protect critical national infrastructure.
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