• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
• /
• v.7 no.2
• /
• pp.125-131
• /
• 2009

An electrolytic system (zinc anode-gallium cathode) was setup to evaluate the performance of several stirrers prepared for this study, where stirrers have been used to prevent uranium from forming dendrite on the cathode in pyrochemical process. In the case of no-stirring condition, zinc dendrites began to grow on the gallium surface in 1 hour and some dendrite grew out of the cathode crucible around 6 hours. When a rectangular stirrer or a tilt stirrer was rotated, at 40${\sim}$150 rpm, to mix the liquid gallium cathode, dendritic growth of zinc metal was prevented irrespective of revolution speed, but some of the deposits overflowed out of the cathode crucible owing to the large centrifugal forces at 150 rpm. The harrow stirrer did not nearly retard the dendrite growth at 40 rpm, but the dendrite growth was retarded at higher than 100 rpm and the zinc deposits also did not overflow at 150 rpm. Pounder could also prevent the dendrite growth to some extent but it had some difficulties in operation compared with other types of stirrers.

• Journal of the Korean Electrochemical Society
• /
• v.12 no.2
• /
• pp.189-195
• /
• 2009

$\beta-Ga_{2}O_{3}$ nanorods were synthesized by chemical vapor deposition method using nickel-oxide nanoparticle as a catalyst and gallium metal powder as a source material. The average diameter of nanorods was around 160 nm and the average length was $4{\mu}m$. Also, we confirmed that the synthesis of nanorods follows the vapor-solid growth mechanism. From the results of X-ray diffraction and HR-TEM observation, it can be found that the synthesized nanorods consisted of a typical core-shell structure with single-crystalline $\beta-Ga_{2}O_{3}$ core with a monoclinic crystal structure and an outer amorphous gallium oxide layer. Li/$\beta-Ga_{2}O_{3}$ nanorods cell delivered capacity of 867 mAh/g-$\beta-Ga_{2}O_{3}$ at first discharge. Although the Li/$\beta-Ga_{2}O_{3}$ nanorods cell showed low coulombic efficiency at first cycle, the cell exhibited stable cycle life property after fifth cycle.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
• /
• v.8 no.1
• /
• pp.9-17
• /
• 2010

The LCC (Liquid Cadmium Cathode) structure to be developed for inhibiting the formation and growth of the uranium dendrite has been known as a key part in the electrowinning process for the simultaneous recovering of uranium and TRU (TRans Uranium) elements from spent fuels. A zinc-gallium (Zn-Ga) experimental system which is able to be functional in aqueous condition and normal temperature has been set up to observe the formation and growth phenomena of the metal dendrites on liquid cathode. The growth of the zinc dendrites on the gallium cathode and the performance of the existing stirrer type and pounder type cathode structure were observed. Although the mechanical strength of the dendrites appeared to be weak in the electrolyte and easily crashed by the various cathode structures, it was difficult to effectively submerge the dendrite into the bottom of the liquid cathode. Based on the results of the aqueous phase experiments, a lab-scale electrowinning experimental apparatus which are applicable to the development of LCC srtucture for the electrowinning process was established and the performance tests of the different types of LCC structure were conducted to prohibit the uranium dendrite growth on LCC surface. The experimental results of the stirrer type LCC structures have shown that they could not effectively remove the uranium dendrites growing at the inner side of the LCC crucible and the performances of the paddle and harrow type LCC structure were similar. Therefore a mesh type LCC structure was developed to push down the uranium dendrites to the bottom of the LCC crucible growing on the LCC surface and at the inner side of the crucible. From the experimental results for the performance test of the mesh type LCC structure, the uranium was recovered over 5 wt% in cadmium without the growth of uranium dendrites. After completion of the experiments, solid precipitates of the bottom of the LCC crucible were identified as an intermetallic compound (UCd11) by the chemical analysis.