The Experimental Breeder Reactor-II (EBR-II) was a 62.5 MWt±20 MWe sodium cooled fast reactor that was operated successfully for 30 years. Over its period of operation a wealth of fuels and materials information originated from EBR-II. Several missions were conducted in EBR-II, all of which yielded new and valuable additions to the world's knowledge base for nuclear materials. Some of the ®rst ...

The largest experience in operating nuclear power plants has been in nuclear naval propulsion, particularly aircraft carriers and submarines. This accumulated experience may become the basis of a proposed new generation of compact-sized nuclear power plants designs. The mission for nuclear powered submarines is being redefined in terms of signal intelligence gathering and special operations. Th...

Increasing complexity in reactor designs suggests a need to reexamine of methods applied in spent-fuel characterization. The ability to accurately predict the nuclide composition of depleted reactor fuel is important in a wide variety of applications. These applications include, but are not limited to, the design, licensing, and operation of commercial/research reactors and spent-fuel transport...

................................................................................................... 1 2 SPALLATION NEUTRON SOURCE DESIGN ........................................... 3 3 SUBCRITICAL FISSION BLANKET DESIGN ........................................... 4 3.1 FISSION BLANKET NEUTRON MULTIPLICATION ................................................................ 4 3.2 FISSION BLANKET E...

Current research has identified Duplex pellets as an effective strategy for decreasing the centerline temperature of the fuel. However, before this design can be widely utilized several areas, including fission gas release, need to be better characterized. Therefore, this paper seeks to ascertain the relative difference in fission gas release between a standard solid UO2 reference design and a ...

Landfill leachate emerges as a promising feedstock for microbial fuel cells (MFCs). In the present investigation, direct airbreathing cathode-based MFCs are fabricated to investigate the potential of landfill leachate. Three MFCs that have different cathode areas are fabricated and investigated for 17 days under open circuit conditions. The maximum open circuit voltage (OCV) is observed to be a...

Using selective laser extraction technique combined with sensitive ion-counting mass spectrometry, we have analyzed the isotopic structure of fission noble gases in U-free La-Ce-Sr-Ca aluminous hydroxy phosphate associated with the 2 billion yr old Oklo natural nuclear reactor. In addition to elevated abundances of fission-produced Zr, Ce, and Sr, we discovered high (up to 0.03 cm(3) STP/g) con...

TRISO (Tri-Isotropic)-coated fuel particle is widely applied due to its higher stability at high temperature and its efficient retention capability for fission products in the HTGR (high temperature gas-cooled reactor), one of the highly efficient Generation IV reactors. The typical balltype TRISO-coated fuel particle with a diameter of about 1 mm is composed of a nuclear fuel particle as a ker...

Yttria stabilised zirconia (YSZ) inert matrix fuel (IMF) fabricated at PSI and irradiated 3 years in the Halden Material Test Reactor (HBWR) since 2000, has been examined by Electron Probe Microanalysis (EPMA) and Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy (SIMS) after irradiation and compared with data gained for the unirradiated material. The examined pellet cross-section was estimated to have an equiva...

Pebble bed reactors fuel elements are specially suited for withstanding very high burn-up values. This is one of the main characteristics of a transmutation fuel. The higher the burn-up achieved in the fuel, the smaller the number of reprocessing steps needed for obtaining a high transmutation rate. In this paper, a new transmutation cycle option will be introduced, based in a single pass of th...