Alejandra de Lara

MPhil alumni
Department of Engineering
University of Cambridge

Since graduation

Alejandra De Lara is now undertaking a PhD via the The Nuclear Energy Futures CDT and is based at Cambridge. The Nuclear Energy Futures CDT will graduate up to 80 PhDs that will provide innovation and leadership for the future of the UK nuclear industry.

Research interests

Molten salt reactors offer a number of significant advantages compared to currently operating LWRs. High temperature operation allows achieving high thermodynamic efficiency of power conversion using advanced power cycles, as well as a possibility of using nuclear heat directly to drive industrial processes, production of synthetic fuels, such as hydrogen or strict heating.

This project will investigate the design space for salt-cooled reactor cores, where more conventional solid fuel pins are physically separated from the molten salt coolant, enabling simpler chemistry control of the salt coolant and therefore potentially reducing the costs of development for such reactors.