Corkhill, Claire - University of Sheffield - Department of Materials Science and Engineering

个人简介

Claire Corkhill is a Vice Chancellor’s Research Fellow and EPSRC Early Career Research Fellow in the nuclear waste materials-focused Immobilisation Science Laboratory. Previously, she was a post-doctoral research associate in the Departments of Materials Science and Engineering and Civil Engineering at the University of Sheffield. Claire obtained an MEarthSci in Geology and a PhD in Mineralogy and Geochemistry at the University of Manchester, working in the Mineral Physics and Chemistry research group.

研究领域

The UK has a significant inventory of nuclear waste (450,000 cubic metres, enough to fill 1 Wembley Stadium), that will be radioactive for over 100,000 years. For this reason, it is necessary to dispose of the waste safely in a final disposal facility, several hundreds of meters below the ground. This facility is carefully designed to reduce the likelihood of radioactive substances escaping to the environment; it will use a multi-barrier concept where several layers of containment, made from a number of different materials, are used to prevent groundwater reaching the waste – preventing leaching of radioactive substances into the host rock. This concept is called the Engineered Barrier. Claire’s research focuses on understanding and improving the safety functions of this Engineered Barrier. She is interested in understanding how quickly the waste is likely to dissolve if it comes into contact with groundwater, and also how the backfill material helps to prevent the release and transport of radioactive substances to the host rock. Understanding these processes is critical to developing a safe disposal facility, and will also help the design of new, improved materials for the Engineered Barrier. Claire is currently working in four major areas, which are as follows: Grain boundaries1. Grain boundaries – the route to failure of nuclear waste forms in geological disposal? This project explores the role of ceramic microstructures in the dissolution kinetics of spent fuel analogues, through the development of innovative in-situ dissolution imaging techniques. Glass2. State-of-the-art determination of nuclear waste glass durability in sub-surface environments. In this project, the role of different geochemical conditions on the dissolution kinetics of a range of simulant UK HLW and ILW glass are investigated. Cement radionculide interactions3. High resolution spectroscopic determination of radionuclide – cement interactions. Through application of sophisticated spatially-resolved synchrotron X-ray techniques, solid-state NMR and thermodynamic modelling, this project is developing kinetic models of radionuclide-cement interactions in geological disposal environments. Claire is leading the world’s first long-duration x-ray synchrotron experiment in collaboration with Diamond Light Source, to understand the long-term behaviour of cement over thousands of years. 4. Sociology of nuclear waste final disposal. In close collaboration with Dr. Susan Molyneux-Hodgson in the Department of Sociological Sciences, this research focuses on the interlinked areas of publics and policies. We aim to contribute to current understanding of the science and policy behind the safety case for the final nuclear waste disposal facility.

近期论文

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Corkhill C. L., Bailey D. J., Tocino F. Y., Stennett M. C., Miller J. A., Provis J. L., Travis K. P. and Hyatt N. C. Role of microstructure and surface defects on the dissolution kinetics of CeO2, a UO2 fuel analogue. Applied Materials and Interfaces IN PRESS (2016) DOI: 10.1021/acsami.5b11323 Cassingham N. J., Corkhill C. L., Backhouse D. J., Hand R. J. and Hyatt N. C. The dissolution rates of simulated UK Magnox-Thorp blend nuclear waste glass as a function of pH, temperature and waste loading. Mineralogical Magazine, 79, 1529 (2015) available here Zhang H., Corkhill C. L., Heath P. G., Hand R. J. and Hyatt N. C. Effect of ZnO and CaO on the structure and chemical durability of alkali borosilicate glass immobilising simulated UK mixed HLW. Journal of Nuclear Materials, 462, 321 (2015) available here Crean D. E., Corkhill C. L., Nicholls T., Tappero R., Collins J. M. and Hyatt N. C. Expanding the nuclear forensic toolkit: chemical profiling of uranium ore concentrate particles by synchrotron X-ray microanalysis. RSC Advances, 5, 87908 (2015) Myllykylä E., Lavonen T., Stennett M. C., Corkhill C. L., Ollila K. and Hyatt N. C. Solution composition and particle size effects on the dissolution and solubility of a ThO2 analogue for UO2 nuclear fuel. Radiochimica Acta, 103, 565 (2015) Gardner L. J., Bernal S. A., Walling S. A., Corkhill C. L., Provis J. L. and Hyatt N. C. Characterisation of magnesium potassium phosphate cements blended with fly ash and ground granulated blast furnace slag. Cement and Concrete Research, 74, 78 (2015) available here Corkhill C. L., Myllykylä E., Bailey D. J., Thornber S. M., Qi J., Maldonado P., Stennett M. C., Hamilton A. and Hyatt N. C. The contribution of energetically reactive surface features to the dissolution of CeO2 and ThO2 analogues for spent nuclear fuel. ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 6, 12279 (2014) Corkhill C. L., Bridge J. W., Chen X. C., Hillel P., Thornton S. J., Romero-Gonzalez M. E, Banwart S. A and Hyatt N. C. Real-time gamma imaging of technetium transport through natural and engineered porous materials for radioactive waste disposal. Environmental Science and Technology, 47, 13857 (2013) Front cover image. Available here