Assesment of potential swelling of Pressurized Water Reactor internals The GONDOLE experiment in Osiris reactor

International audienc

Investigation of microstructure defects in EUROFER97 under He⁺/Fe³⁺ dual ion beam irradiation

Fusion like conditions for reduced activation ferritic/martensitic steels in the first wall are simulated with single Fe3+ and He+/Fe3+ dual ion beam irradiation of EUROFER97 at the Jannus laboratory, CEA Saclay, introducing a damage of 16 dpa and a helium content up to 260 appm. The samples are irradiated at temperatures of 330 °C, 400 °C and 500 °C. The quantitative determination of size distribution and density of dislocation loops is obtained using weak-beam dark-field imaging mode. Burgers vectors of a02〈111〉 are observed for the majority of dislocation loops at irradiation temperatures of 330 °C and 400 °C. At 500 °C no dislocation loops are found. The impact of single and dual ion beam irradiation on mechanical properties is determined by means of nanoindentation. An increase in nano-hardness of up to 35% due to irradiation was measured at samples irradiated at 400 °C. A kinetic rate model is applied for the description of nucleation and evolution of helium bubbles and compared with the experimental results. Evaluating the rate model with help of TEM-results for size and density of bubbles indicates the nucleation scheme as the main source for quantitative disagreement between the model and irradiation. Keywords: Radiation effects, Ion irradiation, Cluster dynamics, Fusion, Helium bubbles, RAFM steel

Self-healing capacity of nuclear glass observed by NMR spectroscopy

Safe management of high level nuclear waste is a worldwide significant issue for which vitrification has been selected by many countries. There exists a crucial need for improving our understanding of the ageing of the glass under irradiation. While external irradiation by ions provides a rapid simulation of damage induced by alpha decays, short lived actinide doping is more representative of the reality. Here, we report radiological NMR experiments to compare the damage in International Simplified Glass (ISG) when irradiated by these two methods. In the 0.1 mole percent 244Cm doped glass, accumulation of high alpha decay only shows small modifications of the local structure, in sharp contrast to heavy ion irradiation. These results reveal the ability of the alpha particle to partially repair the damage generated by the heavy recoil nuclei highlighting the radiation resistance of nuclear glass and the difficulty to accurately simulate its behaviour by single ion beam irradiations

Understanding and simulating the material behavior during multi-particle irradiations

A number of studies have suggested that the irradiation behavior and damage processes occurring during sequential and simultaneous particle irradiations can significantly differ. Currently, there is no definite answer as to why and when such differences are seen. Additionally, the conventional multi-particle irradiation facilities cannot correctly reproduce the complex irradiation scenarios experienced in a number of environments like space and nuclear reactors. Therefore, a better understanding of multi-particle irradiation problems and possible alternatives are needed. This study shows ionization induced thermal spike and defect recovery during sequential and simultaneous ion irradiation of amorphous silica. The simultaneous irradiation scenario is shown to be equivalent to multiple small sequential irradiation scenarios containing latent damage formation and recovery mechanisms. The results highlight the absence of any new damage mechanism and time-space correlation between various damage events during simultaneous irradiation of amorphous silica. This offers a new and convenient way to simulate and understand complex multi-particle irradiation problems

Dual-beam irradiation of α-iron: Heterogeneous bubble formation on dislocation loops

In order to understand the evolution of materials under irradiation conditions similar to those in future fusion reactors, we have irradiated high purity iron in situ in a transmission electron microscope with 1 MeV Fe+ ions while simultaneously implanting 15 keV He+ ions, at 500 °C. Once not, vert, similar1 dpa/500 appm He were reached, helium bubbles and large dislocation loops were observed. The study reveals that helium bubbles nucleated heterogeneously: a majority of them were observed inside the large dislocation loops. 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Single- and dual-beam in situ irradiations of high-purity iron in a transmission electron microscope: Effects of heavy ion irradiation and helium injection

In order to study the effects of 14 MeV neutron irradiation on materials used in the first walls of future fusion reactors, high-purity iron was ion-irradiated with and without helium in the JANNuS facility. Thin foils of high-purity iron were dual-beam irradiated in situ in a transmission electron microscope using 1 MeV Fe+ and 15 keV He+ ions. Several important results regarding dislocation loops and helium bubbles were obtained. For example, it was demonstrated that dislocation loops with a0 〈0 1 0〉 type Burgers vectors are glissile and can move and eliminate at the surface of the thin foil at 500 °C. A comparison of irradiations with and without helium showed that helium atoms reduce the mobility of dislocation loops in pure iron irradiated at 500 °C. Also, we demonstrated that the heterogeneous formation of bubbles inside dislocation loops found previously is also present for helium implantation rates of ∼80 atomic parts per million (appm) He/displacements per atom (dpa)