At the end of July the Nuclear Energy Industry Club members together with course staff and supervisors from Cambridge met to learn about the progress of the research projects being conducted by the current MPhil students.

The research topics selected by students were based either on problems suggested by industry members or by members of the university. Talks were wide-ranging and their standard was high.

Talks covered on the breadth of the nuclear energy disciplines, including:

• Reactor Physics and Engineering
  • Space reactor thermo-hydraulic design
  • Long life core for marine commercial nuclear
  • Transient model for marine commercial nuclear
  • Re-analysis of thorium light water breeder reactor  tests
• Materials Science
  • Environmentally assisted fatigue of austenitic steels
  • Alternatives to Zircalloy for nuclear fuel element cladding
  • Modifying AGR fuel clad surface to reduce carbon deposition
  • Investigation of hydrides in a Lanthanide by TEM
• Nuclear Waste
  • Vitrified nuclear waste dissolution
• Electrical and electronics
  • Design code for high integrity programmable hardware for nuclear I & C systems
  • Detecting end of life wear-out of nuclear I & C systems
  • Fusion energy storage by super conducting storage rings
• Economics
  • LWR fuel management and economics
  • Systems engineering and economics of commercial nuclear marine