First-Principle Studies on Local Lattice Distortions and Thermodynamic Properties in Non-Stoichiometric Thorium Monocarbide

Qianglin Wei; Lin Zhu; Yiyuan Wu; Yibao Liu; Baotian Wang

doi:10.3390/ma16237484

First-Principle Studies on Local Lattice Distortions and Thermodynamic Properties in Non-Stoichiometric Thorium Monocarbide

Materials (Basel). 2023 Dec 2;16(23):7484. doi: 10.3390/ma16237484.

Authors

Qianglin Wei^{1

2

3}, Lin Zhu², Yiyuan Wu^{1

3}, Yibao Liu^{1

2}, Baotian Wang^{4

5

6}

Affiliations

¹ Engineering Research Center of Nuclear Technology Application, Ministry of Education (East China Institute of Technology), Nanchang 330013, China.
² School of Nuclear Science and Engineering, East China University of Technology, Nanchang 330013, China.
³ Engineering Technology Research Center of Nuclear Radiation Detection and Application, Nanchang 330013, China.
⁴ Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Beijing 100049, China.
⁵ Spallation Neutron Source Science Center, Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Dongguan 523803, China.
⁶ Collaborative Innovation Center of Extreme Optics, Shanxi University, Taiyuan 030006, China.

Abstract

Thorium monocarbide (ThC) is interesting as an alternative fertile material to be used in nuclear breeder systems and thorium molten salt reactors because of its high thermal conductivity, good irradiation performance, and wide homogeneous composition range. Here, the influence of carbon vacancy site and concentration on lattice distortions in non-stoichiometric ThC_1-_x (x = 0, 0.03125, 0.0625, 0.125, 0.1875, 0.25, or 0.3125) is systematically investigated using first-principle calculations by the projector augmented wave (PAW) method. The energy, mechanical parameters, and thermodynamic properties of the ThC_1-x system are calculated. The results show that vacancy disordering has little influence on the total energy of the system at a constant carbon vacancy concentration using the random substitution method. As the concentration of carbon vacancies increases, significant lattice distortion occurs, leading to poor structural stability in ThC_1-x systems. The changes in lattice constant and volume indicate that ThC_0.75 and ThC_0.96875 represent the boundaries between two-phase and single-phase regions, which is consistent with our experiments. Furthermore, the structural phase of ThC_1-x (x = 0.25-0.3125) transforms from a cubic to a tetragonal structure due to its 'over-deficient' composition. In addition, the elastic moduli, Poisson's ratio, Zener anisotropic factor, and Debye temperature of ThC_1-x approximately exhibit a linear downward trend as x increases. The thermal expansion coefficient of ThC_1-x (x = 0-0.3125) exhibits an obvious 'size effect' and follows the same trend at high temperatures, except for x = 0.03125. Heat capacity and Helmholtz free energy were also calculated using the Debye model; the results showed the C vacancy defect has the greatest influence on non-stoichiometric ThC_1-x. Our results can serve as a theoretical basis for studying the radiation damage behavior of ThC and other thorium-based nuclear fuels in reactors.

Keywords: first principle; lattice distortions; non-stoichiometric; random substitution; thermodynamic properties.

Abstract

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