{"title":"Characteristics of metallic uranium aerosols generated under fire conditions","authors":"Min Zhu , Ming Guo , Yanjun Wang , Zhaoqun Shao","doi":"10.1016/j.nucengdes.2025.114021","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Radioactive aerosol will enter the human body through the respiratory system, digestive system and other ways, seriously endangering human health. At present, there are few public reports on the generation of uranium aerosol under combustion conditions, and the experimental conditions in the existing reports differ greatly, resulting in limited reference significance. Therefore, a set of uranium aerosol experiment equipment is designed in this work, and the formation characteristics of two kinds of metallic uranium aerosol under fire conditions are studied. Thus, the information on the particle size distribution, RF (Respirable Fraction), ARF (Airborne Release Fraction) of uranium aerosols was obtained. The results indicate that particle size of two uranium aerosols exhibited log-normal and bimodal distributions, respectively, while the RF values were similar and close to 1 in both cases. The ARF values for combustion products with different compositions exhibited a high degree of similarity. Based on our experiments and literature data, the results suggests that the particle size distribution of uranium aerosols is influenced by the composition and structure of the material significantly, and the ARF is impacted by the specific surface area of the materials.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":19170,"journal":{"name":"Nuclear Engineering and Design","volume":"437 ","pages":"Article 114021"},"PeriodicalIF":1.9000,"publicationDate":"2025-03-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Nuclear Engineering and Design","FirstCategoryId":"5","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0029549325001980","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"NUCLEAR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Radioactive aerosol will enter the human body through the respiratory system, digestive system and other ways, seriously endangering human health. At present, there are few public reports on the generation of uranium aerosol under combustion conditions, and the experimental conditions in the existing reports differ greatly, resulting in limited reference significance. Therefore, a set of uranium aerosol experiment equipment is designed in this work, and the formation characteristics of two kinds of metallic uranium aerosol under fire conditions are studied. Thus, the information on the particle size distribution, RF (Respirable Fraction), ARF (Airborne Release Fraction) of uranium aerosols was obtained. The results indicate that particle size of two uranium aerosols exhibited log-normal and bimodal distributions, respectively, while the RF values were similar and close to 1 in both cases. The ARF values for combustion products with different compositions exhibited a high degree of similarity. Based on our experiments and literature data, the results suggests that the particle size distribution of uranium aerosols is influenced by the composition and structure of the material significantly, and the ARF is impacted by the specific surface area of the materials.
期刊介绍:
Nuclear Engineering and Design covers the wide range of disciplines involved in the engineering, design, safety and construction of nuclear fission reactors. The Editors welcome papers both on applied and innovative aspects and developments in nuclear science and technology.
Fundamentals of Reactor Design include:
• Thermal-Hydraulics and Core Physics
• Safety Analysis, Risk Assessment (PSA)
• Structural and Mechanical Engineering
• Materials Science
• Fuel Behavior and Design
• Structural Plant Design
• Engineering of Reactor Components
• Experiments
Aspects beyond fundamentals of Reactor Design covered:
• Accident Mitigation Measures
• Reactor Control Systems
• Licensing Issues
• Safeguard Engineering
• Economy of Plants
• Reprocessing / Waste Disposal
• Applications of Nuclear Energy
• Maintenance
• Decommissioning
Papers on new reactor ideas and developments (Generation IV reactors) such as inherently safe modular HTRs, High Performance LWRs/HWRs and LMFBs/GFR will be considered; Actinide Burners, Accelerator Driven Systems, Energy Amplifiers and other special designs of power and research reactors and their applications are also encouraged.