Annealing of defects in Fe after MeV Heavy ion irradiation

TL;DR

This study investigates defect recovery in cold rolled iron after high-energy oxygen ion irradiation, revealing how defect migration to different sinks influences recovery dynamics and how these processes depend on energy loss and temperature.

Contribution

It introduces stress-induced defects as a new type of sink and models their role in defect recovery dynamics in irradiated iron.

Findings

Defects migrate to stress-induced and internal surface sinks.

Recovery dynamics depend on electronic energy loss and temperature.

Experimental data fit well with theoretical models.

Abstract

We report study of recovery dynamics, followed by in-situ resistivity measurement after 100 MeV oxygen ion irradiation, in cold rolled Fe at 300K. Scaling behavior with microstructural density and temperature of sample have been used to establish stress induced defects formed during irradiation as a new type of sink. The dynamics after irradiation has been shown to be due to migration of defects to two types of sinks i.e. stress induced defect as variable sinks and internal surfaces as fixed sinks. Experimental data obtained under various experimental conditions have been fitted to theoretical curves. Parameters thus obtained from fitting are employed to establish effect of electronic energy loss and temperature on recovery dynamics and stress associated with variable sinks.