A brief review of cavity swelling and hardening in irradiated copper and copper alloys
The literature on radiation-induced swelling and hardening in copper and its alloy is reviewed. Void formation does not occur during irradiation of copper unless suitable impurity atoms such as oxygen or helium are present. Void formation occurs for neutron irradiation temperatures of 180 to 550{degree}C, with peak swelling occurring at {approximately}320{degree}C for irradiation at a damage rate of 2 {times} 10{sup {minus}7} dpa/s. The post-transient swelling rate has been measured to be {approximately}0.5%/dpa at temperatures near 400{degree}C. Dispersion-strengthened copper has been found to be very resistant to void swelling due to the high sink density associated with the dispersion-stabilized dislocation structure. Irradiation of copper at temperatures below 400{degree}C generally causes an increase in strength due to the formation of defect clusters which inhibit dislocation motion. The radiation hardening can be adequately described by Seeger's dispersed barrier model, with a barrier strength for small defect clusters of {alpha} {approx} 0.2. The radiation hardening apparently saturates for fluences greater than {approximately}10{sup 24} n/m{sup 2} during irradiation at room temperature due to a saturation of the defect cluster density. Grain boundaries can modify the hardening behavior by blocking the transmission of dislocation slip bands, leading to a radiation- modified Hall-Petch relation between yield strength and grain size. Radiation-enhanced recrystallization can lead to softening of cold-worked copper alloys at temperatures above 300{degree}C.
- Research Organization:
- Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (USA)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- DOE/ER
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC05-84OR21400
- OSTI ID:
- 6474179
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-900623-20; ON: DE91000554; TRN: 90-030148
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 15. symposium on effects of radiation on materials, Nashville, TN (USA), 17-21 Jun 1990
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
COPPER
RADIATION HARDENING
SWELLING
COPPER BASE ALLOYS
DAMAGING NEUTRON FLUENCE
GRAIN BOUNDARIES
MICROSTRUCTURE
PHYSICAL RADIATION EFFECTS
TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE
TENSILE PROPERTIES
THERMONUCLEAR REACTOR MATERIALS
VOIDS
ALLOYS
COPPER ALLOYS
CRYSTAL STRUCTURE
ELEMENTS
HARDENING
MATERIALS
MECHANICAL PROPERTIES
METALS
NEUTRON FLUENCE
RADIATION EFFECTS
TRANSITION ELEMENTS
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