From May 13 to 17, 2019, delegation from Shanghai Nuclear Engineering Research & Design Institute (SNERDI) visited Joint Research Centre (JRC) of European Commission in Karlsruhe, Germany, for the seminar of TRANSURANUS user group.

TRANSURANUS, is the code developed by JRC that has been widely suede by safety authorities, research institutes and fuel designers worldwide due to its good prediction on fuel rod irradiation behavior. During the seminar, JRC introduced the latest research achievements and theoretical models on fuel rod thermal performance, mechanic performance, fission gas release, fuel behavior under LOCA and so on.

SNERDI was invited to visit the hot cell and laboratories of JRC, to acknowledge the fuel samples’ cutting & sealing process, thermal condcutivity measurements, fission gas composition measurements, and metallographic phase analysis. Through the JRC visit, SNERDI gets deepener understanding on TRANSUANUS code and gets across to all the research activities behind the code.

Fuel rod performance analysis is known as one of the most complex fields on account of the intricate coupling of thermal-mechanical-fission-material behavior. SNERDI is ongoing to validate the self-designed fuel rod performance code to assist further development of advanced fuel series.