Helium bubbles and trace of lithium in B₄C control rod pellets used in JOYO experimental fast reactor

B₄C pellets used in the control rod of the experimental fast reactor ‘JOYO’ with different ¹⁰B burnups from lower than 10 × 10²⁰ captures/cm³ to 80 × 10²⁰ captures/cm³ and irradiated at less than 800 °C were examined by transmission electron microscopy (TEM). In a B₄C pellet irradiated in an irradiation capsule of ‘JOYO’ at 800 °C up to 30 × 10²⁰ captures/cm³, intragranular helium bubbles appeared in flat plate-shapes with the plane of the plate parallel to the (111) rhombohedral plane. However, in the other specimens that were taken from an actual control rod, the helium gas formed very tiny spherical intergranular bubbles with a diameter of a few nanometers . These tiny bubbles make wavy arrays roughly parallel to the (111) plane. The B₄C specimens were heated on a TEM in situ heating holder up to 1040 °C for 10 min. Clustering of tiny bubbles was observed, but did not extend to the plate-shaped bubbles. In high burnup specimens, large bubbles/cracks were rarely found along the {100} planes, which may correspond to the amorphous bands caused by the slip. While heating the specimens in TEM over 800 °C, liquid phases of lithium-bearing compoundsappeared on the surface of specimen.