5/8/2009 Colloquium - Peter Hosemann

Peter Hosemann Los Alamos National Laboratory

Event Info

Title:  Material Issues in a Heavy Liquid Metal Cooling Environment and Irradiations and Testing of Advanced Materials for Fission

Date: May 8, 2009
Location: 3105 Etcheverry Hall
Time: 4-5pm

Abstract

Material Issues in a Heavy Liquid Metal Cooling Environment and Irradiations and Testing of Advanced Materials for Fission and Fusion Applications

The increasing demand for electrical power in addition to the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions drives the development of advanced nuclear systems. One of the bottlenecks in designing these systems is the development of materials for high irradiation dose and temperature environments, while in contact with different coolants. Limited resources coupled with the high costs for using neutron irradiation facilities push for the need for basic studies using accelerator facilities to carry out preliminary studies in radiation environments. In addition, the reduced radiation doses using low energy ion beams allows one to irradiate in a wide range of environments (e.g. different cooling environments, variable temperature, etc.) as well as making it easier to perform in situ studies. Measuring the mechanical properties on the small irradiation volume produced during ion irradiation is a challenging task. Therefore, small scale materials testing techniques (nanoindentation, microcompression testing, microtensile testing, etc.) have to be developed and applied to engineering alloys in order to characterize material properties during or after irradiation. In order to compare the small (micro-) scale materials testing results to macroscopic materials properties, the material of interest has to be well understood down to smallest length scale. Advanced characterization techniques such as Local Electron Atom Probe (LEAP) allow one to obtain detailed insight of the materials microstructure using small samples. This presentation will present an overview of materials exposed to a harsh environment such as Lead Bismuth Eutectic (LBE) and applications of small (micro-)scale mechanical testing of accelerator irradiated alloys.