Nuclear Materials for Current and Future Reactor Design

Nuclear energy is a zero-emission clean energy source. Nuclear energy is known to produce massive amounts of carbon-free power, and produces more electricity on less land than any other clean-air source. The safe and economical operation of any nuclear power system relies to a great extent on the success of the fuel and structural materials used for operations. During the lifetime of a nuclear power system, which could be few decades, the materials are subjected to extreme conditions of high temperature, high doses, a corrosive environment, and damages from fission products released during fission products. The fuel used in reactor can change its properties depending on fuel composition, phase changes due to irradiation, interaction of fuel with different types of transmutation products, fuel-cladding chemical interaction, and mechanical properties of fuels. Structural materials also face similar challenges due complex irradiation condition including corrosive environment (not limited to water to molten salt).

Some of the critical issues of nuclear materials includes micro-structural and micro-chemistry, physical properties changes due to irradiation and corrosion. Most of the properties in materials could be linked to defect production and evolution; mobility, dissolution, and precipitation of solid, volatile, and gaseous fission products; structure-property correlations; degradation of mechanical properties and structural integrity, and radiation-induced phase changes. Modeling techniques and experimental studies using various advanced characterization techniques for characterizing radiation effects at mesoscale length in materials is important topic of research. Techniques such as laboratory ion beam accelerators, research, and test reactors, as well as commercial nuclear power reactors are all of interest for understanding materials' response. Computational studies across different scales from atomistic to the continuum are critical for understanding and predicting evolution of materials. Nuclear materials discovery and qualification is very challenging in community due to long-lead times and immense expense over the past several decades. In order to increase the pace of innovation and developed novel and advanced materials, high throughput studies are highly desirable.

Areas of particular interest to be covered include:
Fission nuclear materials including metallic and ceramic fuels, cladding, fuel cladding chemical interaction
Irradiation response of materials
Oxidation and corrosion behavior of materials
Materials for fusion reactor application
Radiation effects on materials due to neutrons, particles, electrons
High-throughput characterizations of materials for nuclear applications
Advance manufacturing of materials for nuclear applications
Development of novel alloys including high-entropy alloys for nuclear applications
Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence for data analytics relevant for nuclear applications

Keywords: Radiation effects, Microstructural characterization, Mechanical properties, Oxidation and Corrosion, high-throughput characterizations.

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