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Phase Composition and Elemental Distribution in the Vitrified U-bearing HLW Surrogate
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 February 2011
Abstract
The blocks of glassy material at 55 wt.% SB4 waste loading produced in a demountable cold crucible and cooled to room temperature in cold crucible and glasses cooled in a resistive furnace by a canister centerline cooling (CCC) regime were sectioned to investigate phase composition and elemental distribution between various parts of the blocks. X-ray diffraction (XRD), optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy coupled with energy dispersive spectroscopy (SEM/EDS) and infrared (IR) spectroscopy studies revealed some difference in the texture but not in phase composition of the materials sampled from various parts of the blocks. The glass samples were composed of vitreous and spinel structure phases. Spinel was present as both skeleton-type aggregates of fine (micron- or submicron-sized) crystals segregated at early stages of melt solidification and larger (up to tens of microns) individual more regular crystals formed during slow melt cooling. There was some tendency for elemental segregation in the glass block from the cold crucible with enrichment of the deeper zones with heavier transition metal ions and depletion of Na, Cs, Ca, Al and Si. Uranium was quite uniformly distributed within zones of the block and entered the vitreous phase.
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- Copyright © Materials Research Society 2010