Blistering of rhenium irradiated with 21keV helium ions

Abstract

This paper describes blistering of rhenium following 21 keV He+-ion irradiation at temperatures between 300 K and 1200 K. Blistering starts at 300 K at a dose of 3×1017 ions/cm2. The most probable blister diameter varies from 4400 A at 300 K to 10100 A at 1200 K. The blister depth τ bl , the blister diameter φ bl and the blister heighth bi show a distribution. From the observations one could derive the following relationships:h bl = 0.35φ bl ; τ bl =3.43φ 2/3 . The erosion yieldE y due to blistering is function of doseE y =0.51 atoms/ion at 3×1017 ions/cm2,E y =0.56 atoms/ion at 6×1017 ions/cm2 andE y =0.14 atoms/ion at 3×1018 ions/cm2. The sputtering yieldS (21 keV) is estimated to be ∼0.1 atom/ion. The corresponding surface regression is 44A at 3×1017 ions/cm2 and 1323 A at 9×1018 ions/cm2. Surface regression has therefore little influence on the observations at low doses.