Fuel cladding chemical interaction(FCCI)has long been acknowledged as a problem in the fuel/cladding system,and is likely to be exacerbated at high fuel burn-ups and during the use of metallic fuels bearing transuranic elements,as may be the case for sodium-cooled fast reactors(SFR).In this work,a low temperature coating process using an organometallic precursor,vanadocene Cp2V(Cp=C5H5)was developed.An innovative coating setup has been built to deposit a uniform nanostructured vanadium carbide layer.Diffusion couples of HT9/VC/Ce annealed up to a temperature of 600°C,and compared to the diffusion behavior of uncoated HT9/Ce.These preliminary results strongly advocate that VC coatings may be feasible as diffusion barriers against Ce and possibly other lanthanide fission products.