Nuclear Reactor Physics Fundamentals: Transport, Diffusion, Kinetics, and Reactivity with Solved Practice Problems (The Fundamentals of Nuclear Engineering)

Master the essential physics that governs how nuclear reactors start up, sustain criticality, respond to control actions, and remain stable under real operating conditions. This engineering focused reference builds a rigorous foundation from first principles and carries you through the full chain of analysis used in modern reactor design and core simulation: neutron interactions and cross sections, fission energetics and spectra, moderation and resonance absorption, thermal scattering, diffusion and transport theory, multigroup methods, reflector and buckling theory, control rod worth, perturbation and adjoint techniques, and time dependent kinetics with delayed neutrons and reactivity feedback. Every chapter is designed for practical competence, not just theory. You will work directly with the equations and assumptions that appear in professional calculations, learn when diffusion is valid and when transport is required, and connect neutron balance to measurable engineering quantities such as reaction rates, power distributions, peaking factors, shutdown margins, and transient behavior. To accelerate learning and retention, each chapter includes multiple choice questions plus practice problems with fully explained answers, making it ideal for self study, exam preparation, and day to day reference. Whether you are building intuition for neutron economy, validating models with analytical benchmarks, or preparing to use deterministic and Monte Carlo tools responsibly, this book delivers the clear derivations, careful definitions, and applied problem solving needed to move from formulas to reliable reactor physics decisions.