• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.103-108
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• 2016

In recent years, TRIP steels which are composed of ferrite, bainite, and retained austenite have drawn much attention for automotive sheets due to excellent combination of strength and ductility. The effect of two-step isothermal heat treatment of bainitic transformation on microstructures, especially retained austenites and tensile properties in the conventional TRIP steel was investigated. A two-step isothermal heat treatment, in which 50% bainitic transformation occurred at high temperature, followed by bainitic transformation at low temperature, improves tensile properties, resulting from enhanced mechanical stability of retained austenite against external plastic deformation due to refinement of retained austenites, compared to single-step isothermal heat treatment.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.7
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• pp.1367-1379
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• 2020

The small modular sodium-cooled fast reactor (SMSFR) is an important component of Generation-IV reactors. The objective of this work is to improve the reactivity control in SMSFR by using innovative systems, including burnable poisons and optimized control rods. SMSFR with MOX fuel usually exhibits high burnup reactivity loss that leads to high excess reactivity and potential fuel melting in control rod withdrawal (CRW) accidents, which becomes an important constraint on the safety and economic efficiency of SMSFR. This work applies two types of burnable poisons in a SMSFR to reduce the excess reactivity. The first one homogenously loads minor actinides in the fuel. The second one combines absorber and moderators in specific assemblies. The influence of burnable poisons on the core characteristics is discussed and integrated into the analysis of CRW accidents. The results show that burnable poisons improve the safety performance of the core in a significant way. Burnable poisons also lessen the demand for the number, absorption ability, and insertion depth of control rods. Two optimized control rod designs with rare earth oxides (Eu₂O₃ and Gd₂O₃) and moderators are compared to the conventional design with natural boron carbide (B₄C). The optimized designs show improved neutronic and safety performance.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.81-89
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• 2015

A strain-gradient crystal plasticity constitutive model was developed in order to predict the Hall-Petch behavior of a Ni-base polycrystalline superalloy. The constitutive model involves statistically stored dislocation and geometrically necessary dislocation densities, which were incorporated into the Bailey-Hirsch type flow stress equation with six strength interaction coefficients. A strain-gradient term (called slip-system lattice incompatibility) developed by Acharya was used to calculate the geometrically necessary dislocation density. The description of Kocks-Argon-Ashby type thermally activated strain rate was also used to represent the shear rate of an individual slip system. The constitutive model was implemented in a user material subroutine for crystal plasticity finite element method simulations. The grain size dependence of the flow stress (viz., the Hall-Petch behavior) was predicted for a Ni-base polycrystalline superalloy NIMONIC PE16. Simulation results showed that the present constitutive model fairly reasonably predicts 0.2%-offset yield stresses in a limited range of the grain size.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Heat Treatment
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.306-316
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• 2013

Microstructure and fracture behavior of a multi-phase low-density steel were investigated. After hot-rolling and heat treatment, the microstructure of low-density steel was composed of coarse ferrite grains and elongated bands which include second phases such as austenite, martensite and ${\kappa}$-carbide depending on holding time during isothermal heat treatment. After tensile test, microcracks were observed at martensite or ${\kappa}$-carbide interface in the elongated bands. Coarse ferrite grains showed cleavage fracture behavior regardless of second phase. The cleavage fracture of ferrite could be attributed to their coarse grain size and solute atoms that increase ductile-to-brittle transition temperature of ferrite. Despite of the tendency of cleavage fracture in coarse ferrite grains, a specimen having coarse spheroidized ${\kappa}$-carbide particles in the elongated bands showed high total elongation of 30%. Thus, the easiness of plastic deformation in the elongated band seems to play an important role in retardation of cleavage crack formation in coarse ferrite grains.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.138-143
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• 2007

The effects of texturing and anti-reflection coating on the reflection properties of multi-crystalline silicon solar cell have been investigated. The chemical solutions of alkaline and acidic etching solutions were used for texturing at the surface of multi-crystalline Si wafer. Experiments were performed with various temperature and time conditions in order to determine the optimized etching condition. Alkaline etching solution was found inadequate to the texturing of multi-crystalline Si due to its high reflectance of about 25%. The reflectance of Si wafer texturing with acidic etching solution showed a very low reflectance about 10%, which was attributed to the formation of homogeneous. Also, deposition of ITO anti-reflection coating reduced the reflectance of multi-crystalline si etched with acidic solution($HF+HNO_3$) to 2.6%.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.591-602
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• 2007

The results of Reactivity-Initiated Accidents (RIA) experiments have been analysed and the main variables affecting the fuel failure propensity identified. Fuel burn-up aggravates the mechanical loading of the cladding, while corrosion, or better the hydrogen absorbed in the cladding as a consequence of corrosion, may under some conditions make the cladding brittle and more susceptible to failure. Experiments point out that corrosion impairs the fuel resistance for RIA transient occurring at cold conditions, whereas there is no evidence of important embrittlement effects at hot conditions, unless the cladding was degraded by oxide spalling. A fuel failure threshold correlation has been derived and compared with experimental data relevant for BWR and PWR fuel. The correlation can be applied to both cold and hot RIA transients, account taken for the lower ductility at cold conditions and for the different initial enthalpy. It can also be used for non-zero power transients, provided that a term accounting for the start-up power is incorporated. The proposed threshold is easy to use and reproduces the results obtained in the CABRI and NSRR tests in a rather satisfactory manner. The behaviour of advanced PWR alloys and of MOX fuel is discussed in light of the correlation predictions. Finally, a probabilistic approach has been developed in order to account for the small scatter of the failure predictions. This approach completes the RIA failure assessment in that after determining a best estimate failure threshold, a failure probability is inferred based on the spreading of data around the calculated best estimate value.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.155-160
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• 2003

Plasma spraying technique was used to fabricate functionally graded coating (FGC) of NiCrAIY/YSZ 8wt%$Y_2O_3-ZrO_2$ on a Co-base superalloy (HAYNES 188) substrate. Six layers were coated on the substrate for building up compositionally graded architecture. Conventional thermal barrier coating (TBC) of NiCrAIY/SZ with sharp interface was also fabricated. As-coated FGC and TBC samples were exposed at the temperature of $1100^{\circ}C$ for 10, 50, 100 hours in air. Microstructural change of thermally exposed samples was examined. Pores and microcracks were formed in YSZ layer due to evolution of thermal internal stress at high temperature. The amount of pores and microcracks in YSZ layer were increased with increasing exposure time at high temperature. High temperature oxidation of coatings occurred mainly at the NiCrAIY/YSZ interface. In comparison with the case of TBC. the increased area of the NiCrAIY/YSZ interface in FGC is likely to attribute to forming the higher amount of oxides.

• Journal of Korea Foundry Society
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.268-272
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• 2008

Interfacial characteristics of aluminum borate whisker reinforced AS52 matrix composite was investigated. Peak hardness of AS52 composite was obtained aging at $170^{\circ}C$ for 15h and the aging process was accelerated by the presence of the aluminium borate whisker. The MgO layer, which was the interfacial reaction product between the reinforcement and the Mg matrix, was produced with 20 nm thickness in as-cast condition. As the aging time increased, the thickness of the interfacial reaction layer increased to 50 nm in peak aged condition. The nano-indentation test results indicated that the strength of interface was improved by the aging but over-aging degraded the reinforcement and decreased the interfacial strength which resulted in the decrease of overall composite strength.

• Proceedings of the Korean Powder Metallurgy Institute Conference
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• 2006.09a
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• pp.85-86
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• 2006

A theoretical model is applied to the analysis of thermomechanical properties of $Al-SiC_p$ FGMs in this study. Functionally graded $Al-SiC_p$ composites ($Al-SiC_p$ FGMs) consisted with 10 layers gradually changing volume fractions of Al and $SiC_p$ were fabricated using the pressureless infiltration technique. $Al-SiC_p$ FGMs plates of total thickness of 3mm, 5mm and 7mm with fairly uniform distribution and compositional gradient of $SiC_p$ reinforcement in the Al matrix throughout the thickness was successfully fabricated. The curvature of $Al-SiC_p$ FGM plates was measured to check the internal stress distribution predicted via a theoretical model for the analysis of thermo-mechanical deformation. The evolution of curvature and also internal stresses in response to temperature variations could be predicted for the different combinations of geometric thickness of FGM plates. Theoretical prediction of thermally induced stress distribution makes it possible to design FGM structures without any critical failure during the usage of them.

• Journal of Korea Foundry Society
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.13-20
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• 2000

In the present study,($10%Al_2O_3+5%Si$)/AZ91 Mg hybrid composite was fabricated using the squeeze casting method. During squeeze casting, Molten Mg was infiltrated into the preform of $10%Al_2O_3+5%Si$ and reaction product of $Mg_2Si$ intermetallic compound was formed by the reaction between molten Mg and Si Powder. Microstructure has been observed and mechanical properties were evaluated for the reaction squeeze cast(RSC) hybrid composite. It was found that Si powder totally reacted with molten Mg to form $Mg_2Si$. Reinforcement($Al_2O_3$) and the reaction product ($Mg_2Si$) are fairly uniformly distributed in Mg Matrix for the squeeze cast hybrid composite. Mechanical Properties were improved with hybridization of reinforcements, namely higher hardness and enhanced wear resistance comparing squeeze cast($15%Al_2O_3$)/AZ91 Mg composite.