MOX fuels (UO₂‐PuO₂) are used in light water nuclear reactors of several countries and are also potential candidates for the fast neutron reactors. Industrial MOX is currently manufactured by a dry route process, involving steps with fine powders. To reduce dusting, enhance MOX powder flow properties, and decrease manufacturing scrap rate, a new wet route process is investigated: the freeze granulation of concentrated water‐based powder suspensions having optimized rheology and dispersion properties. Highly flowable, dustless, and easy‐to‐press MOX granules have been elaborated. Sintering green compacts made of such granules gives highly dense and defect‐free pellets that have a very homogeneous U‐Pu spatial distribution, thus improving the fuel characteristics. Indeed, MOX fuels devoid of large Pu‐rich aggregates are thought to have a better behavior under irradiation in reactors by limiting/preventing the formation of the typical high burnup structure.

中文翻译：

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使用冷冻制粒路线生产的致密且均质的MOX燃料颗粒

MOX燃料（UO ₂ -PuO ₂）已在多个国家的轻水核反应堆中使用，也是快速中子反应堆的潜在候选者。工业MOX目前是通过干法工艺制造的，包括细粉步骤。为了减少粉尘，增强MOX粉末的流动性并降低制造废品率，研究了一种新的湿法工艺：对具有最佳流变性和分散性的浓缩水性粉末悬浮液进行冷冻制粒。高度可流动，无尘且易于压制的MOX颗粒已经过精心设计。用这种颗粒制成的生坯烧结成高密度，无缺陷的颗粒，U-Pu空间分布非常均匀，从而改善了燃料特性。确实，