1. Context

Like scientific research, nuclear safety research is based on a process of constant questioning and challenge, with a view to improving knowledge. It is based on a combination of experimental and theoretical activities, to which digital simulation is increasingly being added, thanks to advances in information technology and computers.

More often than not, and especially when they directly concern nuclear fuel, the questions raised by the safety of a facility involve a large number of elementary physical or chemical phenomena, coupled together, which may be difficult or even impossible to observe and measure, due to very aggressive thermochemical conditions or the impossibility of carrying out measurements without disturbing the phenomena observed. These difficulties have led to the implementation of an experimental approach combining so-called "separate-effects"...