AUTHOR=Das Aniruddh , Altstadt Eberhard , Kaden Cornelia , Kapoor Garima , Akhmadaliev Shavkat , Bergner Frank TITLE=Nanoindentation Response of Ion-Irradiated Fe, Fe-Cr Alloys and Ferritic-Martensitic Steel Eurofer 97: The Effect of Ion Energy JOURNAL=Frontiers in Materials VOLUME=8 YEAR=2022 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/materials/articles/10.3389/fmats.2021.811851 DOI=10.3389/fmats.2021.811851 ISSN=2296-8016 ABSTRACT=

Nanoindentation of ion-irradiated nuclear structural materials and model alloys has received considerable interest in the published literature. In the reported studies, the materials were typically exposed to irradiations using a single ion energy varying from study to study from below 1 MeV to above 10 MeV. However, systematic investigations into the effect of self-ion energy are still insufficient, meaning that the possibilities to gain insight from systematic energy variations are not yet exhausted. We have exposed pure Fe, ferritic Fe-9Cr, martensitic Fe-9Cr and the ferritic-martensitic reduced-activation steel Eurofer 97 to ion irradiations at 300°C using 1, 2 and 5 MeV Fe2+ ions as well as 8 MeV Fe3+ ions and applied nanoindentation, using a Berkovich diamond indenter, to characterize as-irradiated samples and unirradiated references. The effect of the ion energy on the measured nanoindentation response is discussed for each material. Two versions of a primary-damage-informed model are applied to fit the measured irradiation-induced hardening. The models are critically compared with the experimental results also taking into account reported microstructural evidence. Related ion-neutron transferability issues are addressed.