Heat capacity measurements on uranium-cerium mixed oxides by differential scanning calorimetry

Uranium-cerium mixed oxides of three different compositions (U0.2Ce0.8)O2 (U0.5Ce0.5)O2 and (U0.8Ce0.2)O2, were prepared by combustion synthesis and characterized by XRD. The compositional characterization was done by ICP-AES. Heat capacity measurements employed a heat flux type differential scanning calorimeter from 280 to 820 K. The heat capacity values of (U0.2Ce0.8)O2 (U0.5Ce0.5)O2 and (U0.8Ce0.2)O2 at 298 K are 62.8, 64.2 and 70.1 J K-1 mol-1, respectively. Enthalpy increment, entropy and Gibbs energy function were computed from the heat capacity data