RESUMEN
Radiation-induced heterogeneous damage is the single largest source of failures seen in structural components in nuclear power reactors. Single crystal materials without grain boundaries, show considerable promise for overcoming this problem. In this work, such heterogeneous damage was further overcome in NixFe1-x single crystal alloys via a simple strategy of fine-tuning the composition. [001] NixFe1-x (x = 0, 0.38 and 0.62 at%) single crystals prepared using the Bridgman method were irradiated over a wide fluence range (4 × 1013 to 4 × 1015 ions per cm2). The irradiation-induced defect evolution was studied using Rutherford backscattering/channeling spectrometry, Monte Carlo simulations, transmission electron microscopy and nanoindentation. The results indicate an increased radiation tolerance of Ni0.38Fe0.62 compared to pure Ni and Ni0.62Fe0.38. The structural analysis performed by transmission electron microscopy revealed that defects tend to agglomerate at one place in Ni and Ni0.62Fe0.38, while in Ni0.38Fe0.62 no defect accumulation zone (characteristic damage peak) has been captured either at low or high fluence. Moreover, we found that the hardness change with the increase of Fe content is due to different arrangements of Fe atoms in the crystal structure, which influences the obtained mechanical properties of NixFe1-x in the pristine state and after ion implantation.
RESUMEN
Synchrotron-based microprobe x-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) has been used to study the local atomic structure of chromium in chromia-doped uranium dioxide (UO2) grains. The specimens investigated were a commercial grade chromia-doped UO2 fresh fuel pellet, and materials from a spent fuel pellet of the same batch, irradiated with an average burnup of ~40 MW d kg(-1). Uranium L3-edge and chromium K-edge XAS have been measured, and the structural environments of central uranium and chromium atoms have been elucidated. The Fourier transform of uranium L3-edge extended x-ray absorption fine structure shows two well-defined peaks of U-O and U-U bonds at average distances of 2.36 and 3.83 Å. Their coordination numbers are determined as 8 and 11, respectively. The chromium Fourier transform extended x-ray absorption fine structure of the pristine UO2 matrix shows similar structural features with the corresponding spectrum of the irradiated spent fuel, indicative of analogous chromium environments in the two samples studied. From the chromium XAS experimental data, detectable next neighbor atoms are oxygen and uranium of the cation-substituted UO2 lattice, and two distinct subshells of chromium and oxygen neighbors, possibly because of undissolved chromia particles present in the doped fuels. Curve-fitting analyses using theoretical amplitude and phase-shift functions of the closest Cr-O shell and calculations with ab initio computer code FEFF and atomic clusters generated from the chromium-dissolved UO2 structure have been carried out. There is a prominent reduction in the length of the adjacent Cr-O bond of about 0.3 Å in chromia-doped UO2 compared with the ideal U-O bond length in standard UO2 that would be expected because of the change in effective Coulomb interactions resulting from replacing U(4+) with Cr(3+) and their ionic size differences. The contraction of shortest Cr-U bond is ~0.1 Å relative to the U-U bond length in bulk UO2. The difference in the local chromium environment between fresh and irradiated UO2 is discussed based on the comparison of quantitative structural information obtained from the two chromia-doped fuel samples analyzed.