Mesoporous materials in the field of nuclear industry: applications and perspectives

Abstract

In the context of increasing global energy demand associated with high prices for classical fossil fuels and rising concerns about CO 2 emissions, nuclear power is attracting renewed interest. Despite the recent accident in the Fukushima power plant, numerous countries maintain very ambitious nuclear programmes. The Generation IV International Forum [A Technology Roadmap for Generation IV Nuclear Energy Systems, Generation IV International Forum, 2002] (an initiative launched by the US Department of Energy in 2000 to coordinate and promote efforts to design the next generation of nuclear power plants) supports works to develop new power plant designs and innovative concepts in the nuclear fuel cycle. These new concepts aim at achieving higher levels of security and resource efficiency as well as a higher resistance towards nuclear proliferation. Because of this blossoming of new ideas, mesoporous materials, which are already widely found in applications such as catalysis, sensing and optics, are expected to make their way in the field of nuclear power production. Up to now, some (hybrid) mesoporous solids have already been investigated as solid ligands to remove actinides and fission product contaminants from liquid effluents, but also as model materials to investigate radiation defects, as possible nuclear waste disposal form and as functional materials to be placed in or close to new forms of nuclear waste matrices. This contribution aims at reviewing the applications of mesoporous materials already described in the field of nuclear industry, and to underline some promising research directions in this area.

The Synthetic Strategy for Developing Mesoporous Materials through Nanocasting Route

“…Mesoporous materials are defect tolerant and may undergo self-healing processes but surprisingly behavior of nanocasted mesoporous materials under irradiation has not been yet studied [213]. Use of biosynthesized polymers as hard template as Natural rubber latex [214] for getting mesoporous structures opens the future prescriptive for researcher working in the area.…”

Catalytic Activity of Nanocrystalline Porous La<SUB>0.8</SUB>K<SUB>0.2</SUB>Fe<SUB>1−<I>x</I></SUB>Mn<SUB><I>x</I></SUB>O<SUB>3</SUB> for Simultaneous Removal of Soot and Nitrogen Oxides

“…Nanoporous materials have attracted extensive interests for their unique properties in various fields in comparison with their bulk counterparts. Recently, Ariga et al [28][29] Makowski et al 30 Xuan et al 31 Kong et al 32 Olyveira et al 33 from the point-of-view of nanoarchitectonics reported advancements in mesoporous materials design and synthesis, activation and modification, and their diverse applications in catalysis, environmental engineering, nuclear industry, separation, drug delivery, sensing, imaging and biology. Based on our previous work for La 1−x K x FeO 3 (x = 0-0.4) which resulted in the optimized composition of La 0 8 K 0 2 FeO 3 , 34 this investigation focused on the effect of substituted-Mn in the B-site with the partial substitution of Fe on the microstructure and catalytic performance of nanocrystalline, porous, perovskite La 0 8 K 0 2 Fe 1−x Mn x O 3 (x = 0-0.5) for simultaneous removal of soot and nitrogen oxides from practical diesel exhaust emissions.…”

Study on the gamma-ray irradiation behavior of mesoporous silica adsorbents functionalized with phosphine oxide and phosphonic acid ligands

“…Recently, mesoporous materials have been investigated as adsorbents to remove actinides and fission product contaminants from liquid wastes [6]. They hold high specific surface areas, thermal and mechanical stability, tunable pore size, high adsorption capacity, as well as extraordinarily wide possibilities of functionalization.…”