Peridynamic modeling of fuel pellet cracking

This study presents the peridynamic simulation of thermal cracking behavior in uranium dioxide, UO2 fuel pellets that are used in light water reactors (LWR). The performance of the reactor is influenced by the thermo-mechanical behavior of the pellets. During the fission process, the pellets are subjected to high temperature gradients, and the oxygen diffusion significantly affects the temperature distribution. Therefore, a coupled analysis of temperature and oxygen diffusions and deformation is unavoidable in order to predict accurate cracking behavior in a fuel pellet. The accuracy of the predictions is verified qualitatively by comparing with the previous studies.