• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.515-522
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• 2003

Tritium behavior in the solid breeder blanket is one of the key factors in determining tritium self-sufficiency, as well as safety, of fusion reactors. Recently, a model has been developed to describe the tritium behavior in solid breeder material, which can predict the tritium release and inventory in the blanket. However, the model has limitation to account for tritium solubility effects, mainly existing as LiOT, especially inside the $Li_{2}O$ solid breeder. In order to improve the capability of predicting the LiOT precipitation in $Li_{2}O$ solid breeder, a new logic is developed and integrated in the existing tritium release and inventory calculation code. With the logic developed in this work, the code can have capabilities to analyze tritium release and inventories in $Li_{2}O$ under steady and transient conditions. It can be found that tritium inventory as LiOT is an important mechanism under pulsed operation, and the amount of inventory becomes higher as the tritium generation rate increases and the temperature decreases. Also, the temperature limits for the generation of LiOT precipitation are determined. Therefore the developed logic helps understand the tritium transport mechanism in $Li_{2}O$ solid breeder.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.10
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• pp.3438-3448
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• 2021

Dynamic seals are one of the critical components of Absorber Rod Drive Mechanism of Fast Breeder Reactors, requiring separate experimental development. Their significance can't be overemphasized considering that the availability and re-usability of Control Rod Drive Mechanisms of Fast Breeder Test Reactor is governed by the failure rate of dynamic seals (bellows). For prototype and subsequent Fast Breeder Reactors in India, choice of the dynamic seal is changed to an in-house designed & developed labyrinth type V-ring seal. The present work is related to the numerical investigations carried out to gain insights into the sealing mechanism and the thermal behaviour of these seals. The results indicate that the seal geometry is very important for obtaining optimum performance. By changing the geometry of the present seal, performance enhancement by more than 50% in important indices is obtained. Further, the results point out that caution shall be exercised when the seal material & its operating temperature are changed. Also, the numerical model developed in this study will be useful for developing more robust dynamic seals in future.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.123-129
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• 1999

Although type 316 stainless steel is widely used such as in reactors of petrochemical plants and pipes of steam power plants and s attracting attention as potential basic material for the fast breeder reactor structure alloys in nuclear power plants and is attracting attention as potential basic material for the fast breeder reactor structure alloys in nuclear power plants the effect of precipitates which form during the long term exposure at service temperature on creep properties is not known sufficiently. In this study to investigate the creep properties and the influence of prior aging on the microstructure to form precipitates specimens were first solutionized at 113$0^{\circ}C$ for 20 minutes and then aged for different times of 0 hr, 100 hrs, 1000 hrs and 2200 hrs at 75$0^{\circ}C$ After heat treatments tensile tests both at room temperature and $650^{\circ}C$ and constant load creep ruptuere tests were carried out.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.50 no.5
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• pp.333-340
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• 2013

To fabricate spherical lithium titanate ($Li_2TiO_3$) pebbles which are used for a breeder material in fusion reactor, titanium oxide ($TiO_2$) granules were used as a starting material. The granules were pre-sintered, and then aqueous lithium nitrate solution infiltrated into the granules at vacuum condition. The granules were crystallized to $Li_2TiO_3$ after sintering under the control of process parameters. In this study, the concentration of lithium in the solution, as well as the number of penetration times and sintering temperature affected the final crystallite phase and the microstructure of the pebbles. In particular, the sphericity and size of the pebbles were effectively controlled by a technical rolling process. The useful spherical $Li_2TiO_3$ pebbles which have 10~20% porosity and 60~120 N compressive strength were obtained through the sintering at $1000{\sim}1100^{\circ}C$ in the multi-times infiltration process with 50 wt% solution. The physical properties of pebbles such as density, porosity and strength, can be controlled by a selection of $TiO_2$ powders and control of processing parameters. It can be thought that the lithium penetration method is a useful method for the fabrication of mass product of spherical $Li_2TiO_3$ pebbles.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.314-319
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• 2016

Reduced activation ferritic-martensitic steels (RAFM) are envisaged in future fusion technology as structural material which will be in direct contact with a flowing liquid lead-lithium melt, serving as breeder material. Aluminium-based coatings had proven their ability to protect the structural material from corrosion attack in flowing Pb-15.7Li and to reduce tritium permeation into the coolant, significantly. Coming from scales produced by hot dipping aluminization (HDA), the development of electrochemical-based processes to produce well-defined aluminium-based coatings on RAFM steels gained increased attention in research during the last years. Two different electrochemical processes are described in this paper: The first one, referred to as ECA, is based on the electrodeposition of aluminium from volatile, metal-organic electrolytes. The other process called ECX is based on ionic liquids. All three processes exhibit specific characteristics, for example in the field of processability, control of coating thicknesses (low activation criteria) and heat treatment behavior. The aim of this article is to compare these different coating processes critically, whereby the focus is on the comparison of ECA and ECX processes. New results for ECX will be presented and occurring development needs for the future will be discussed.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.55 no.8
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• pp.2966-2976
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• 2023

A tritium breeder is a lithium-based material capable of producing tritium. Many researchers designing nuclear-fusion energy are studying tritium production using pebbles, which are solid-type breeders. The sphericity and size of the pebbles are critical in obtaining pebbles with good tritium-breeding efficiency. Furthermore, tritium-release efficiency can be increased by using pebbles with appropriate porosities. Promising raw materials for tritium-breeding materials include Li₄SiO₄ and Li₂TiO₃. Li₄SiO₄ has a higher lithium density than Li₂TiO₃ and exhibits excellent tritium-breeding efficiency. However, it has the disadvantage of being easily decomposed during the Li₄SiO₄-green-pebble sintering process because of its low structural stability at high temperatures and high lithium density. In this study, we attempted to determine the optimal conditions for manufacturing Li₄SiO₄ pebbles using the droplet-freeze-drying method. The optimal Li₄SiO₄ slurry conditions and sintering temperatures were determined. The optimal Li₄SiO₄ slurry-fabrication conditions were 3 wt% polyvinyl alcohol and 75 wt% Li₄SiO₄ based on the deionized-water weight content. The sintering temperature at which Li₄SiO₄ did not decompose and exhibited the optimum porosity of 10.8% was 900 ℃.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.177-198
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• 2012

This paper reviews the fast reactor physics and computational methods. The basic reactor physics specific to fast spectrum reactors are briefly reviewed, focused on fissile material breeding and actinide burning. Design implications and reactivity feedback characteristics are compared between breeder and burner reactors. Some discussions are given to the distinct nuclear characteristics of fast reactors that make the assumptions employed in traditional LWR analysis methods not applicable. Reactor physics analysis codes used for the modeling of fast reactor designs in the U.S. are reviewed. This review covers cross-section generation capabilities, whole-core deterministic (diffusion and transport) and Monte Carlo calculation tools, depletion and fuel cycle analysis codes, perturbation theory codes for reactivity coefficient calculation and cross section sensitivity analysis, and uncertainty analysis codes.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.264-268
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• 2008

An assessment of creep-fatigue crack behavior is required to ensure the structural integrity for high temperature components such as fast breeder reactor structures or thermal power plant components operating at an elevated temperature. In this study, an evaluation of creep-fatigue crack growth has been carried out according to the French assessment guide of the RCC-MR A16 for austenitic stainless steel structures. The assessment procedures for creep-fatigue crack growth in the recent version of the A16 (2007 edition) have been changed considerably from the previous version (2002 edition) and the material properties (RCC-MR Appendix A3) have been changed as well. The impacts of those changes on creep-fatigue crack growth behavior are quantified from the assessments with a structural model. Finally the assessment results were compared with the observed images obtained from the structural tests of the same structural specimen.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1994.07b
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• pp.1431-1434
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• 1994

The annular induction electromagnetic pump with maximum flowrate of $60{\ell}/min$ for the sodium coolant system of liquid metal fast breeder reacters has been designed using the equivalent circuit method. The final optimum values of geometrical and electromagnetic parameters were obtained for an annular induction pump from the relation of the electrical variables giving the developing force to the fluid and the pressure drops between both sides of the pump. The physical properties of the core, coil condoctor materials in the high temperature and pump cooling systems under operation have been taken into account in the design of the pump. The structural material were also selected considering the reaction with sodium and the magnetic field distortion.

• KOREAN JOURNAL OF CROP SCIENCE
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• v.47
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• pp.124-134
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• 2002

The sweetpotato, Ipomoea batatas L. (Lam.), is one of the important summer upland crops in Korea and has been used as human food, industrial yaw material and vegetable. Sweetpotato has been consumed for human foods such as boiled, roasted, fried or salad etc. It should be developed for higher quality as a snack or health food, primarily through improving the eating and marketing qualities as well as nutritional value. Its quality after cooking or processing is a complex one combining the aroma, taste, texture and fiber content. The other important qualities for consumers are root shape, size, skin color, flesh color, insect and disease resistance, nutritional components and safety from phytoalexins(toxic stress metabolites) etc. Korean people generally prefer to red skin color, round or elliptic shape and dry texture, yellow flesh color of sweetpotato which is high in starch content including vitamins and nutrients. The almost factors of quality components of sweetpotato are genetically controlled by breeder, but postharvest handlings and marketing management for making high quality goods should be done thoroughly according to the quality evaluation criteria of sweetpotato from the moment of harvest until shipping them to the market by farmers and the other users. This paper describes current status and prospects of the quality evaluations and researches in sweetpotato roots in Korea.