RU-Net for Automatic Characterization of TRISO Fuel Cross Sections

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Hauptverfasser: Cai, Lu, Xu, Fei, Xian, Min, Tang, Yalei, Sun, Shoukun, Stempien, John
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Cai, Lu
Xu, Fei
Xian, Min
Tang, Yalei
Sun, Shoukun
Stempien, John
author_facet Cai, Lu
Xu, Fei
Xian, Min
Tang, Yalei
Sun, Shoukun
Stempien, John
contents During irradiation, phenomena such as kernel swelling and buffer densification may impact the performance of tristructural isotropic (TRISO) particle fuel. Post-irradiation microscopy is often used to identify these irradiation-induced morphologic changes. However, each fuel compact generally contains thousands of TRISO particles. Manually performing the work to get statistical information on these phenomena is cumbersome and subjective. To reduce the subjectivity inherent in that process and to accelerate data analysis, we used convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to automatically segment cross-sectional images of microscopic TRISO layers. CNNs are a class of machine-learning algorithms specifically designed for processing structured grid data. They have gained popularity in recent years due to their remarkable performance in various computer vision tasks, including image classification, object detection, and image segmentation. In this research, we generated a large irradiated TRISO layer dataset with more than 2,000 microscopic images of cross-sectional TRISO particles and the corresponding annotated images. Based on these annotated images, we used different CNNs to automatically segment different TRISO layers. These CNNs include RU-Net (developed in this study), as well as three existing architectures: U-Net, Residual Network (ResNet), and Attention U-Net. The preliminary results show that the model based on RU-Net performs best in terms of Intersection over Union (IoU). Using CNN models, we can expedite the analysis of TRISO particle cross sections, significantly reducing the manual labor involved and improving the objectivity of the segmentation results.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2509_12244
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle RU-Net for Automatic Characterization of TRISO Fuel Cross Sections
Cai, Lu
Xu, Fei
Xian, Min
Tang, Yalei
Sun, Shoukun
Stempien, John
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Artificial Intelligence
During irradiation, phenomena such as kernel swelling and buffer densification may impact the performance of tristructural isotropic (TRISO) particle fuel. Post-irradiation microscopy is often used to identify these irradiation-induced morphologic changes. However, each fuel compact generally contains thousands of TRISO particles. Manually performing the work to get statistical information on these phenomena is cumbersome and subjective. To reduce the subjectivity inherent in that process and to accelerate data analysis, we used convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to automatically segment cross-sectional images of microscopic TRISO layers. CNNs are a class of machine-learning algorithms specifically designed for processing structured grid data. They have gained popularity in recent years due to their remarkable performance in various computer vision tasks, including image classification, object detection, and image segmentation. In this research, we generated a large irradiated TRISO layer dataset with more than 2,000 microscopic images of cross-sectional TRISO particles and the corresponding annotated images. Based on these annotated images, we used different CNNs to automatically segment different TRISO layers. These CNNs include RU-Net (developed in this study), as well as three existing architectures: U-Net, Residual Network (ResNet), and Attention U-Net. The preliminary results show that the model based on RU-Net performs best in terms of Intersection over Union (IoU). Using CNN models, we can expedite the analysis of TRISO particle cross sections, significantly reducing the manual labor involved and improving the objectivity of the segmentation results.
title RU-Net for Automatic Characterization of TRISO Fuel Cross Sections
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Artificial Intelligence
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.12244