Abstract
The structural response of Dy2TiO5 oxide under swift heavy ion irradiation (2.2 GeV Au ions) was studied over a range of structural length scales utilizing neutron total scattering experiments. Refinement of diffraction data confirms that the long-range orthorhombic structure is susceptible to ion beam-induced amorphization with limited crystalline fraction remaining after irradiation to 8 × 1012 ions/cm2. In contrast, the local atomic arrangement, examined through pair distribution function analysis, shows only subtle changes after irradiation and is still described best by the original orthorhombic structural model. A comparison to Dy2Ti2O7 pyrochlore oxide under the same irradiation conditions reveals a different behavior: while the dysprosium titanate pyrochlore is more radiation resistant over the long-range with smaller degree of amorphization as compared to Dy2TiO5, the former involves more local atomic rearrangements, best described by a pyrochlore-to-weberite-type transformation. These results highlight the importance of short-range and medium-range order analysis for a comprehensive description of radiation behavior.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 19 |
Journal | npj Materials Degradation |
Volume | 5 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Dec 2021 |
Externally published | Yes |
Funding
This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, under Award DE-SC0020321. The research at ORNL’s Spallation Neutron Source was sponsored by the Scientific User Facilities Division, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, U.S. Department of Energy. I.M.G. acknowledges support from the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists, Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) program. The SCGSR program is administered by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE) for the DOE. ORISE is managed by ORAU under contract number DE‐SC0014664. All opinions expressed in this paper are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the policies and views of DOE, ORAU, or ORISE. C.O. acknowledges support from the Center for Materials Processing (CMP) at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The authors gratefully acknowledge technical support during the neutron scattering experiments by Michelle Everett (Oak Ridge National Laboratory) and editing support by Devon Drey (University of Tennessee). The authors wish to express their thanks to anonymous reviewers for constructive remarks which improved the manuscript.