To improve the determination of heat and mass transfer in fuel-coolant interaction codes appropriate knowledge of the conditions inside the melt droplets is needed. A simplified mathematical model for the determination of the melt droplet conditions is introduced, considering the material physical properties of the melt droplet. Since the computational demand of the mathematical model would significantly increase the overall computational time of the fuel-coolant interaction codes, a simplification based on the temperature profile approach is presented. Finally, a physically-based approach, which is simple enough to be practical for the implementation into computer codes and complex enough to consider adequately the material properties, is proposed and validated. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.