b'developed for fuel characterizationat LANSCE.Supported by AFC, a custom sample holder was designed and fabricated. The sample was encapsulated in the sample container in the hot cell at INL (Luca Capriotti/INL) and shipped to LANL where the material was characterized at the High-Pressure/Preferred Orientation (HIPPO, Sven Vogel/LANL) neutron time-of-flight diffractometer and the energy-resolved neutron imaging (ERNI, Alex Long/LANL) beamline at LANSCE in the fall of 2020 and summer 2021. Data analysis and interpretation are still on-going. Improved experimental setup and novel imaging data analysis methods for the energy-resolved neutron imaging, the latter supported Figure 2. Diffraction data collectedstandard neutron scattering vanadiumby a LANL Laboratory Directed Research on the HIPPO instrument showingcan as a secondary containment. and Development (LDRD), are for the the strong diffraction peaks from thefirst time applied to this sample (Thilo aluminum sample holder with theThe sample and sample containerBalke, Alex Long, Sven Vogel, Brendt Rietveld fit (green curve, black tickwere shipped to LANL in a shieldingWohlberg/all LANL, Anton Tremsin/marks refer to Al peaks). The weakercontainer. The sample emits at a doseUC Berkely, Charles Bouman/Purdue peaks not fit in this preliminary analysis originate from the U-Zr phases inrate of ~3R/hr on contact whichUniversity). The novel imaging analysis the irradiated material and can bedecreases to 20 mR/hr at 2 metersmethods allow to better interpret the indexed with a cubic crystal structure.distance and is therefore manage- inherently low counting statistics data Notably absent are diffraction peaksable with remote handling, withoutcollected during the energy-resolved from orthorhombic -uranium that are observed in fresh U-10Zr fuelrequiring a cask. The disk-shaped mate- neutron imaging measurement.e.g., between 2.5 and 2.7(positionsrial is larger than samples prepared for indicated by red tick-marks). Theanalysis using electron or X-ray methodsFirst preliminary results on the powder thermal neutron absorption of thediffraction data analysis, showing 46.5 wt% enriched fuel made neutronand is therefore an intermediate stepthe crystallographic phases present diffraction challenging. towards characterization of bulk samplesin the irradiated material, are shown at LANSCE. However, since it coversin Figure 2. Non-spatially resolved the full diameter of the irradiated fuelneutron resonance data, providing a slug, some insight on redistribution ofhigher sensitivity to isotopes present elements, spatially resolved informationonly in smaller concentrations, was also on microstructure, e.g., phase composi- collected and is presented in Figure 3. tion and texture, will be possible usingNote that the results shown here are the pulsed neutron-based methodspreliminary results and the analysis and interpretation (Luca Capriotti/44 2021|AFC ACCOMPLISHMENTS'