Simulation of the fracture behavior of Zircaloy-4 cladding under reactivity-initiated accident conditions with a damage mechanics model combined with fuel performance codes FEMAXI-7 and RANNS

A continuum damage mechanics model using FEM calculations was proposed to be applied to an analysis of the fuel failure due to pellet cladding mechanical interaction (PCMI) under reactivity-initiated accident conditions. The model expressed ductile fracture via two processes: damage nucleation related to void nucleation and damage evolution related to void growth and linkage. The boundary conditions for the simulations were input from the fuel performance codes FEMAXI-7 and RANNS. The simulation made reasonable predictions for the cladding hoop strain at failure and reproduced the typical fracture behavior of the fuel cladding under the PCMI loading, characterized by a ductile shear zone in the inner region of the cladding wall. It was shown that occurrence of a through-wall crack is determined at an early stage of crack propagation, and the rest of the through-wall penetration process is achieved with a negligible increment in strain. The effect of a local temperature rise in the cladding inner region on the failure strain was found to be less than 5% for the conditions investigated. Failure strains predicted under a plane strain loading were smaller by 20%–30% than those predicted under equibiaxial tensions between the hoop and the axial directions.     

Lipids in human parotid saliva with regard to caries experience

It has been reported that saliva may play an important role in the prevention and development of enamel caries and that both lipids and protein contents in saliva may be relevant to this role. This study examined the lipid and protein levels in saliva from individuals differing in caries experience. Female subjects (20 to 21 years old) were used divided equally into two groups, caries-susceptible group (CSG) and caries-resistant group (CRG). Stimulated parotid saliva and stimulated whole saliva were collected from the subjects. After centrifugation, each saliva sample was analyzed for the concentrations of lipids and proteins and for the compositions of lipids and fatty acids. The lipid and protein contents in parotid saliva increased in proportion to increase of the flow rate. The lipid content was slightly correlated with the protein one (r = 0.33). Total lipid and protein concentrations were higher in the samples from CSG than those from CRG. The lipid composition was similar in the samples from the two groups; more than half in total lipids was neutral lipids, followed by glycolipids and phospholipids. Neutral lipids and free fatty acid and triacylglyceride concentrations were significantly higher in the samples from CSG than those from CRG (p<0.01 for each). Also stearic, linoleic and docosahexaenoic acids were significantly higher in the former group than the latter one (p<0.05 and p<0.01). In summary, the lipid concentrations in parotid saliva from caries susceptible subjects were higher than those from caries resistant ones, and the difference in fatty acid composition was detected between them. The variations in the lipid levels and fatty acid composition may be associated with those in caries development.     

Photostability of Isovaline and its Precursor 5-Ethyl-5- methylhydantoin Exposed to Simulated Space Radiations

Aqueous solutions of isovaline and its precursor molecule, 5-ethyl-5-methylhydantoin, were irradiated with ultraviolet and γ-ray photons, to evaluate their structural stability against space radiation. The degree of photolysis was measured and irradiation products were identified using chiral, reversed-phase and ion-exchange high-performance liquid chromatography. The experimental results show that the degree of photolysis of 5-ethyl-5-methylhydantoin is more significant than that of isovaline under ultraviolet light irradiation, while the results under γ-ray irradiation are the opposite. As the products of isovaline photolysis, aspartic acid, serine, glutamic acid and alanine were dominantly detected.     

Cohesiveness and hydrodynamic properties of young drinking water biofilms

Drinking water biofilms are complex microbial systems mainly composed of clusters of different size and age. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) measurements were performed on 4, 8 and 12 weeks old biofilms in order to quantify the mechanical detachment shear stress of the clusters, to estimate the biofilm entanglement rate ξ. This AFM approach showed that the removal of the clusters occurred generally for mechanical shear stress of about 100 kPa only for clusters volumes greater than 200 μm³. This value appears 1000 times higher than hydrodynamic shear stress technically available meaning that the cleaning of pipe surfaces by water flushing remains always incomplete. To predict hydrodynamic detachment of biofilm clusters, a theoretical model has been developed regarding the averaging of elastic and viscous stresses in the cluster and by including the entanglement rate ξ. The results highlighted a slight increase of the detachment shear stress with age and also the dependence between the posting of clusters and their volume. Indeed, the experimental values of ξ allow predicting biofilm hydrodynamic detachment with same order of magnitude than was what reported in the literature. The apparent discrepancy between the mechanical and the hydrodynamic detachment is mainly due to the fact that AFM mechanical experiments are related to the clusters local properties whereas hydrodynamic measurements reflected the global properties of the whole biofilm.     

Remarkable improvement of the signal-to-noise ratio of Mn/Fe in-beam Mössbauer spectroscopy

In-beam Mössbauer spectroscopy utilizing unstable ⁵⁷Mn beams is a powerful method to extract physical and chemical properties at the atomic scale. A parallel plate avalanche counter (PPAC), optimized to detect conversion electrons generated by the Mössbauer effect, can be employed to suppress higher-energy background γ rays. However, β rays are emitted by the ⁵⁷Mn parent nuclei of ⁵⁷Fe, which can significantly degrade the spectrum quality. In the present work, we have developed a new anti-coincidence-detection system with a thin plastic scintillation counter (0.5 mmt), which can be used to detect β rays and reject them from the recorded PPAC events. To demonstrate the anti-coincidence system, we carried out Mössbauer spectroscopy utilizing ⁵⁷Mn nuclei that were implanted into a non-magnetic aluminum metal plate at room temperature. Using the anti-coincidence method, we obtained a typical Mössbauer spectrum of high quality, despite a very low number of implanted ⁵⁷Mn atoms, of ∼5 × 10⁹. The signal to noise ratio of the obtained spectrum was increased remarkably, and the relative peak height above the baseline increased from 10% to 220% using the anti-coincidence method. The developed detection system is applicable to investigation of in situ properties, and avoids the potentially problematic agglomeration of probes in a sample.     

Cancer chemopreventive ability of conjugated linolenic acids

Conjugated fatty acids (CFA) have received increased interest because of their beneficial effects on human health, including preventing cancer development. Conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) are such CFA, and have been reviewed extensively for their multiple biological activities. In contrast to other types of CFAs including CLA that are found at low concentrations (less than 1%) in natural products, conjugated linolenic acids (CLN) are the only CFAs that occur in higher quantities in natural products. Some plant seeds contain a considerably high concentration of CLN (30 to 70 wt% lipid). Our research group has screened CLN from different plant seed oils to determine their cancer chemopreventive ability. This review describes the physiological functions of CLN isomers that occur in certain plant seeds. CLN are able to induce apoptosis through decrease of Bcl-2 protein in certain human cancer cell lines, increase expression of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor (PPAR)-γ, and up-regulate gene expression of p53. Findings in our preclinical animal studies have indicated that feeding with CLN resulted in inhibition of colorectal tumorigenesis through modulation of apoptosis and expression of PPARγ and p53. In this review, we summarize chemopreventive efficacy of CLN against cancer development, especially colorectal cancer.     

Space charge capacitance of ferroelectric memory cells in the nonlinear regime

Abstract

Recently ferroelectric thin-film capacitors have been modelled using the sub-surface space charge region. The model is similar to the well known abrupt p-n junction theory or semiconductors. This paper describes the sub-surface space charge using the landau free energy within a polarized medium. The capacitance of the ferroelectric storage cell is described from these first principles. The model predicts that the result of the abrupt p-n junction depletion capacitance (linear medium model) is the limit of the ferroelectric p-n junction model (non-linear medium) when the polarization approaches zero. The results of the model are applied successfully to 60/40 PZT capacitors where the intrinsic heterogeneity (high electron concentration in the near surface region) is always present due to high oxygen vacancy concentration. Both the linear and the nonlinear models are reasonable at high voltages but only the non-linear model is accurate at lower voltages. The results are also useful to characterize device parasitics and elucidate the effect of the microstructure on device behavior.     

Hydrogenation properties and crystal structures of Ti−Mn-V BCC solid solution alloys

We have proposed new hydrogen absorbing alloys of the ‘Laves phase related BCC solid solution alloy’, the hydrogen capacity of which reaches almost double that of conventional rare-earth based AB₅ alloys. We have reported the hydrogen absorbing properties of Ti−V−Mn, Ti−V−Cr and T−V−Mn−Cr alloys. It has been accepted that the crystal structural change of BCC hydrogen absorbing alloys is the same as that of V metal. The mono-hydride (H/M=1) of V metal has a BCT structure and the di-hydride (H/M=2) has an FCC structure. However, we recently found that the Ti−V−Mn alloy shows different behaviors in phase transformation with hydrogenation to V metal. We found three hydride phases with a BCC, a deformed FCC and an FCC structure in the Ti−V−Mn solid solution alloy-H₂ system. The deformed FCC hydride phase has not yet to our knowledge been reported. The lattice constant of the deformed FCC was 0.407 nm, one axis of which is reduced by about 4%. Its single-phase region appeared at a hydrogen content between 0.8 H/M and 1.0 H/M in absorption at 298 K. The lower plateau observed due to formation of the deformed FCC hydride phase gives an increase of effective hydrogen capacity by decreasing hydrogen remaining in the alloy in the desorption process. This article based on a presentation made in the symposium “The 2nd KIM-JIM Joint Symposium: Hydrogen Absorbing Materials”, held at Hanyang University, Seoul, Korea, October 27–28, 2000 under the auspices of The Korean Institute of Metals and Materials and The Japan Institute of Metals.     

Limit of gate oxide thickness scaling in MOSFETs due to apparentthreshold voltage fluctuation induced by tunnel leakage current

We report on a new roadblock which will limit the gate oxide thickness scaling of MOSFETs. It is found that statistical distribution of direct tunnel leakage current through 1.2 to 2.8 nm thick gate oxides induces significant fluctuations in the threshold voltage and transconductance when the gate oxide tunnel resistance becomes comparable to gate poly-Si resistance. By calculating the measured tunnel current based on multiple scattering theory, it is shown that the device characteristics fluctuations will be problematic when the gate oxide thickness is scaled down to less than 1 nm