ZrC is a material of interest for next-generation nuclear fuel applications — for example, as a replace­ment or supplement for the SiC diffusion barrier coating in Tri-structural isotropic coated fuel particle (TRISO) coated fuel particles in high-temperature gas-cooled reactors. There are two main incentives to develop ZrC for this application. First, higher fuel operating temperatures, and thus higher efficiency of next-generation reactors, would be enabled by the higher degradation temperatures ZrC offers over SiC. There is evidence that fission product diffusion will be slower in ZrC and that ZrC is more resistant to fission product attack.158 Second, its sensitivity to oxidation recommends ZrC as an effective oxygen getter, inhibiting the so-called ‘amoeba effect’ insidi­ous in SiC-based TRISO, which involves a thermal gradient-induced diffusion of carbon and effective migration of UO2 fuel out of its protective coating layers, in part, due to an excessive oxygen potential (see, for instance, Bullock and Kaae).159