• 한국세라믹학회지
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• 제46권6호
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• pp.574-582
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• 2009

$UO_2$ microsphere particles, core material of HTGR(High Temperature Gas Reactor) nuclear fuel, were prepared using by the GSP(Gel Supported Precipitation) method which is a modified-method of the wet sol-gel process. The spherical shape of initial liquid ADU droplets from the vibration nozzle system was continuously kept till the conversion to the final $UO_2$ microsphere. But the size of a final $UO_2$ microsphere was shrunken to about 25% of an initial ADU droplet size. Also, we found that the composition of dried-ADU gel particles was constituted of the very complicated phases, coexisted the U=O, C-H, N-H, N-O, and O-H functional groups by FT-IR. The important factors for obtain the no-crack $UO_2$ microsphere during the thermal treatment processes must perfectly wash out the remained-$NH_4NO_3$ within the ADU gel particle in washing process and the selections of an appropriate heating rate at a suitable gas atmosphere, during the calcining of ADU gel particles, the reducing of $UO_3$ particles, and the sintering of $UO_2$ particles, respectively.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제51권2호
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• pp.495-500
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• 2019

When a new fuel is developed, various mechanical properties are absolutely necessary for a safety analysis of the fuel for the licensing and prediction of its mechanical behavior during operation and accident conditions. In this paper, a mechanically equivalent surrogate plate of U-Mo dispersion fuel is presented using tungsten, substitute material of U-Mo particle. A surrogate plate, composed of tungsten/aluminum dispersion meat and aluminum alloy cladding, is manufactured with the same fabrication process with that of fuel plate except that a tungsten powder is used instead of U-Mo powder. A modal test showed that the surrogate plate and fuel plate have similar dynamic characteristics, and a tensile test demonstrated the similarity of the material property up to the yield strength range. The conducted tests proved that the surrogate tungsten plate has equivalent mechanical behaviors with that of a fuel plate, which leads to the acceptable use of a surrogate fuel assembly using tungsten/aluminum dispersion meat in various mechanical tests. The surrogate fuel assembly can be utilized for various out-of-pile characteristic tests, which are necessary for the licensing achievement of a research reactor that uses U-Mo dispersion fuel as a driver.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권5호
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• pp.897-907
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• 2020

The flow characteristics of reactor fuel assembly always intrigue the designers and the experimentalists among the myriad phenomena that occur simultaneously in a nuclear core. In this work, the visual experimental method has been developed on the basis of refraction index matching (RIM) and particle image velocimetry (PIV) techniques to investigate the detailed flow characteristics in China fast reactor fuel subassembly. A 7-rod bundle of simulated fuel subassembly was fabricated for fine examination of flow characteristics in different subchannels. The experiments were performed at condition of Re=6500 (axial bulk velocity 1.6 m/s) and the fluid medium was maintained at 30℃ and 1.0 bar during operation. As for results, axial and lateral flow features were observed. It is shown that the spiral wire has an inhibitory effect on axial flow and significant intensity of lateral flow mixing effect is induced by the wire. The root mean square (RMS) of lateral velocity fluctuation was acquired after data processing, which indicates the strong turbulence characteristics in different flow subchannels.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제48권3호
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• pp.624-634
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• 2016

Nuclear criticality safety analyses (NCSAs) considering burnup credit were performed for the GBC-32 cask. The used nuclear fuel assemblies (UNFAs) discharged from Hanbit Nuclear Power Plant Unit 3 Cycle 6 were loaded into the cask. Their axial burnup distributions and average discharge burnups were evaluated using the DeCART and Multi-purpose Analyzer for Static and Transient Effects of Reactors (MASTER) codes, and NCSAs were performed using SCALE 6.1/STandardized Analysis of Reactivity for Burnup Credit using SCALE (STARBUCS) and Monte Carlo N-Particle transport code, version 6 (MCNP 6). The axial burnup distributions were determined for 20 UNFAs with various initial enrichments and burnups, which were applied to the criticality analysis for the cask system. The UNFAs for 20- and 30-year cooling times were assumed to be stored in the cask. The criticality analyses indicated that $k_{eff}$ values for UNFAs with nonuniform axial burnup distributions were larger than those with a uniform distribution, that is, the end effects were positive but much smaller than those with the reference distribution. The axial burnup distributions for 20 UNFAs had shapes that were more symmetrical with a less steep gradient in the upper region than the reference ones of the United States Department of Energy. These differences in the axial burnup distributions resulted in a significant reduction in end effects compared with the reference.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제48권3호
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• pp.751-757
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• 2016

The present work discusses two different models of boiling water reactor (BWR) bundle to compare the neutronic characteristics of uranium dioxide ($UO_2$) and uranium zirconium hydride ($UZrH_{1.6}$) fuel. Each bundle consists of four assemblies. The BWR assembly fueled with $UO_2$ contains $8{\times}8$ fuel rods while that fueled with $UZrH_{1.6}$ contains $9{\times}9$ fuel rods. The Monte Carlo N-Particle Transport code, based on the Mont Carlo method, is used to design three dimensional models for BWR fuel bundles at typical operating temperatures and pressure conditions. These models are used to determine the multiplication factor, pin-by-pin power distribution, axial power distribution, thermal neutron flux distribution, and axial thermal neutron flux. The moderator and coolant (water) are permitted to boil within the BWR core forming steam bubbles, so it is important to calculate the reactivity effect of voiding at different values. It is found that the hydride fuel bundle design can be simplified by eliminating water rods and replacing the control blade with control rods. $UZrH_{1.6}$ fuel improves the performance of the BWR in different ways such as increasing the energy extracted per fuel assembly, reducing the uranium ore, and reducing the plutonium accumulated in the BWR through burnup.

• 한국세라믹학회지
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• 제44권10호
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• pp.580-584
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• 2007

The ZrC layer instead of SiC layer is a critical and essential layer in TRISO coated fuel particles since it is a protective layer against diffusion of fission products and provides mechanical strength for the fuel particle. In this study, we carried out computational simulation before actual experiment. With these simulation results, Zirconium carbide (ZrC) films were chemically vapor deposited on $ZrO_2$ substrate using zirconium tetrachloride $(ZrCl_4),\;CH_4$ as a source and $H_2$ dilution gas, respectively. The change of input gas ratio was correlated with growth rate and morphology of deposited ZrC films. The growth rate of ZrC films increased as the input gas ratio decreased. The microstructure of ZrC films was changed with input gas ratio; small granular type grain structure was exhibited at the low input gas ratio. Angular type structure of increased grain size was observed at the high input gas ratio.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제56권1호
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• pp.283-291
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• 2024

Sodium cooled Fast Reactors (SFR) are built with several engineered safety features and hence a severe accident such as a core melt accident is hypothetical with a probability of <10^-6/ry. However, in case of such accidents, the mixture of the molten fuel and structural materials interacts with sodium. This phenomenon is known as Molten Fuel Coolant Interaction (MFCI) and results in fragmentation of the melt due to various instabilities. The fragmented particles settle as a debris bed on the core catcher at the bottom of the reactor vessel, and continue to generate decay heat. Characteristics of the debris particles play a vital role in heat transfer from the bed and need thorough investigation. The size, shape, and physical state of the debris depend on the associated fragmentation mechanism, superheating of the melt, and sodium temperature. Experiments have been conducted by releasing simulated corium, a molten mixture of alumina and iron generated by the aluminothermy process at ~2400 ℃ into liquid sodium, to study the fragmentation phenomena. After the experiment, the fragmented debris was retrieved and the particle size distribution was determined by sieve analysis. The debris was subjected to microscopic investigation for obtaining morphological characteristics. Based on the characteristics of debris, an attempt has been made to assess of fragmentation mechanism of simulated corium in sodium.

• KSTLE International Journal
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• 제4권1호
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• pp.8-13
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• 2003

Abrasion in fretting wear mechanism is studied experimentally with the specimens of two different shapes of spacer grid spring and fuel tubes of a nuclear fuel. Reciprocating sliding wear test has been carried out in the environment of air and water at room temperature. Especially, third body abrasion is referred to for explaining the wear region expansion found during the slip displacement increase with constant normal contact farce. It is found that the expansion behaviour depends on the contact shape. The small clearance between the tube and spring seems to be the preferable region of the wear particle accumulation, which causes third body abrasion of the non-contact area. Even in water environment the third body abrasion occurs apparently. Since the abrasion on the clearance contributes wear volume, the influence of the contact shape on the severity of third body abrasion should be considered to improve the grid spring design in the point of restraining wear damage of a nuclear fuel.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제48권1호
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• pp.175-181
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• 2016

This study investigates the dispersibility of carbon in carbon contained ammonium diuranate (C-ADU) gel particles and the characteristics of C-ADU gel liquid droplets produced by the vibrating nozzle and integrated aging-washing-drying equipment. It was noted that the excellent stability of carbon dispersion was only observed in the C-ADU gel particle that contained carbon black named CB 10. ADU gel liquid droplets containing carbon particles with the excellent sphericity of approximately 1,950 mm were then obtained using an 80-100-Hz vibrating nozzle system. Dried C-ADU gel particles obtained by the aging-washing-drying equipment were thermal decomposed until $500^{\circ}C$ at a rate of $1^{\circ}C/min$ in an air or in 4% $H_2$ gas atmosphere. The thermally decomposed C-ADU gel particles showed 24% weight loss and a more complicated profile than that of ADU gel particles.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제52권5호
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• pp.925-936
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• 2020

To ascertain the characteristics of pool sloshing behavior that might be encountered during a core disruptive accident of sodium-cooled fast reactors, in our earlier work several series of experiments were conducted under various scenarios including the condition with mono-sized solid particles. It is found that under the particle-bed condition, three typical flow regimes (namely the bubble-impulsion dominant regime, the transitional regime and the bed-inertia dominant regime) could be identified and a flow-regime model (base model) has been even successfully established to estimate the regime transition. In this study, aimed to further understand this behavior at more realistic particle-bed conditions, a series of simulated experiments is newly carried out using mixed-size particles. Through analyses, it is verified that for present scenario, by applying the area mean diameter, our previously-developed base model can provide the most appropriate predictive results among the various effective diameters. To predict the regime transition with a form of extension scheme, a correction factor which is based on the volume-mean diameter and the degree of convergence in particle-size distribution is suggested and validated. The conducted analyses in this work also indicate that under certain conditions, the potential separation between different particle components might exist during the sloshing process.