Long-lived reductions in recoilless fractions following Coulomb excitation

Time-independent reductions in recoilless fractions have been observed in the M\"ossbauer effect following simultaneous Coulomb excitation of the first excited states of W¹⁸³ and W¹⁸² in WO₃. These results are not in agreement with models predicting only a local temperature increase following excitation, but can be understood in terms of long-lived radiation damage effects.