Patent ID: 8675809

Claim:
A nuclear fuel rod with metal cladding having exterior burnable poison particles thereon in exterior contact with aqueous reactor coolant, the fuel rod having an axis, and an outer abraded surface on said metal cladding; an initial layer of burnable poison particles, having a particle size of from 1 micrometer to 250 micrometers, on said outer abraded, metal cladding surface of said nuclear fuel rod where the initial layer of the burnable poison particles are adhered to said outer surface of said metal cladding at a phase change interface caused by impact of the particles where said phase change interface is selected from the group consisting of molecular surface melting of the metal cladding, atom bonding due to crystal formation and inner atom diffusion between the burnable poison and cladding; additional layers of adhering burnable poison particles on said initial layer, where the exterior layer of the additional layers has a protective oxidation caused by contact with the aqueous coolant, wherein the burnable poison particles are selected from the group consisting of elemental boron, elemental gadolinium, elemental hafnium, elemental erbium, HfB 2 , ZrB 2 , Gd 2 O 3 , and mixtures thereof; the metal cladding is a zirconium based metal, and wherein fuel pellets are contained inside the metal cladding.