Annealing simulation of cascade damage in α-Fe – Damage energy and temperature dependence analyses

Highlights: ► We conducted cascade annealing simulations of α-Fe using kinetic Monte Carlo method. ► The mechanism of temperature dependence of surviving defects was clearly identified. ► The results can be handed over the modeling using rate equations. - Abstract: In this paper, kinetic Monte Carlo method was applied to investigate the long time evolution of cascade damage prepared by molecular dynamics simulations in α-Fe up to recoil energy of more than 200 keV. We conducted thorough investigation on how the surviving defects vary with cascade damage energy and annealing temperature. The results can be used for input parameters of rate equations to simulate microstructural evolution under irradiation. The study also suggested that neighboring sub-cascades evolves almost independently during annealing, and that the temperature dependence of the annealing results can be explained by the temperature dependence of vacancy-migration and vacancy-dissociation probabilities.