Multiscale modeling of thermal conductivity of high burnup structures in UO2 fuels

The high burnup structure forming at the rim region in UO2 based nuclear fuel pellets has interesting physical properties such as improved thermal conductivity, even though it contains a high density of grain boundaries and micron-size gas bubbles. To understand this counterintuitive phenomenon, mesoscale heat conduction simulations with inputs from atomistic simulations and experiments were conducted to study the thermal conductivities of a...