Depth distribution of Frank loop defects formed in ion-irradiated stainless steel and its dependence on Si addition

Abstract

Although heavy ion irradiation is a good tool to simulate neutron irradiation-induced damages in light water reactor, it produces inhomogeneous defect distribution. Such difference in defect distribution brings difficulty in comparing the microstructure evolution and mechanical degradation between neutron and heavy ion irradiation, and thus needs to be understood. Stainless steel is the typical structural material used in reactor core, and could be taken as an example to study the inhomogeneous defect depth distribution in heavy ion irradiation and its influence on the tested irradiation hardening by nano-indentation. In this work, solution annealed stainless steel model alloys are irradiated by 3MeV Fe2+ ions at 400°C to 3dpa to produce Frank loops that are mainly interstitial in nature. The silicon content of the model alloys is also tuned to change point defect diffusion, so that the loop depth distribution influenced by diffusion along the irradiation beam direction could be discussed. Results show that in low Si (0% Si) and base Si (0.42% Si) samples the depth distribution of Frank loop density quite well matches the dpa profile calculated by the SRIM code, but in high Si sample (0.95% Si), the loop number density in the near-surface region is very low. One possible explanation could be Si’s role in enhancing the effective vacancy diffusivity, promoting recombination and thus suppressing interstitial Frank loops, especially in the near-surface region, where vacancies concentrate. By considering the loop depth distribution, the tested irradiation hardening is successfully explained by the Orowan model. A hardening coefficient of around 0.30 is obtained for all the three samples. This attempt in interpreting hardening results may make it easier to compare the mechanical degradation between different irradiation experiments.