Radiation damage in stainless steel under varying temperature neutron irradiation

Microstructural evolution of model alloys of 316SS was examined by neutron irradiation at JMTR under cyclic temperature varying condition. In the case of Fe-16Cr-17Ni, formation of interstitial loops and voids are strongly suppressed by varying the temperature from 473K to 673K. By adding Ti as miner element (0.25wt%), however, abnormal accumulation of vacancies (void swelling of 11%dpa at 0.1dpa) was observed. Theoretical analysis standing on the rate theory of defect clustering and simulation irradiation experiments with heavy ions indicates that the vacancy-rich condition which appears temporally during and after changing the temperature from low to high brings these results. It was also shown that only 1 dpa pre-irradiation at low temperature changes swelling behavior at high temperature above several 10 dpa. The understanding of non-steady-state defect processes under temperature varying irradiation is very important to estimate the radiation damage under fusion environment where short-term and long-term temperature variation is expected. (author)