Investigation of grain orientations of melt-textured HTSC with addition of uranium oxide, Y₂O₃ and Y₂BaCuO₅

Local grain orientations were studied in melt-textured YBCO samples processed with various amounts of depleted uranuim oxide (DU) and Y ₂O₃ by means of electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) analysis. The addition of DU leads to the formation of Ucontaining nanoparticles (Y₂Ba₄CuUO_x) with sizes of around 200 nm, embedded in the superconducting Y-123 matrix. The orientation of the Y ₂BaCuO₅ (Y-211) particles, which are also present in the YBCO bulk microstructure, is generally random as is the case in other melttextured Y-123 samples. The presence of Y-211 particles, however, also affects the orientation of the Y-123 matrix in these samples.