Characterization of irradiation induced defects in structural materials

In the next generation reactors typical dose is expected to be in the range of 100-200dpa and temperature in the vicinity of 500°C which needs long neutron irradiation exposure to be able to reliably predict structural property changes in the materials upon irradiation. In this regard, use of proton and heavy ions to study irradiation damage would be an attractive proposition. Though proton irradiation emulates neutron irradiation very closely relatively low dose rate imparted by proton (10^-5-10^-6 dpa/s) making proton radiation studies involving high radiation doses (~100 dpa; expected in materials of future fast breeder reactors) practically not feasible. Therefore, heavy ion damage (~10^-3 dpa/s) appears a more suitable option to simulate the damage caused by neutron irradiation for high doses. In the present study, few examples, covering range of alloys, like, F-M steel T91, Zr and Nb based alloys will be used to demonstrate the applicability of the approach