Facilities
The following experimental research facilities are available:
- High-performance computing with support from the Manchester Computing
Centre.
- Apart from the standard materials testing machines available to the
Group in the School of MACE, it also has access to a wide range of
state-of-the-art materials testing and characterization equipment
at the School of Materials.
- ABAQUS Finite Element Programme
- Radioactive ‘Controlled’ Laboratory
- Super computer (8 dual core processors, 8 GB of RAM and over 1TB
of hard disk space) is designed to do stress analysis of nuclear
graphite brick and to perform whole reactor core modelling for Advanced Gas-Cooled
Reactor.
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Capabilities
The current activities of the Group cover many aspects of nuclear graphite
technology, including:
- Graphite material property changes due to fast neutron damage
and radiolytic oxidation
- Graphite component stress analysis
- Whole reactor core behaviours including thermal aspects
- Decommissioning, treatment and disposal of nuclear graphite waste
- Statiscal analysis of irradiated graphite data
- Statistical analysis and modelling of irradiated graphite
- High resolutions microstural studies
- Stored (Wigner) energy analysis
- SIMPLEWARE 3D code
- Isotopic determination of irradiated graphite
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Techniques
- Multi-scale finite element stress, fracture and thermal modelling
- Electronic Speckled Pattern Interferometry (ESPI)
- X-ray Tomography
- X-ray Diffraction (XRD)
- Dynamic modal testing
- Thermal testing
- Raman Spectroscopy
- Optical Microscopy
- Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM)
- High ResolutionTransmission Electron Microscopy (TEM)
- High precision Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS)
- Focused Ion Beam – Field Emission Gun Scanning Electron Microscopy
(FIB-FEGSEM)
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