Abstract
Zirconium diboride (ZrB2) has many potentially beneficial properties for fusion plasma-facing component application, but almost no data exist on the response of ZrB2 to ion irradiation. In this work, ZrB2 samples were irradiated with 30 keV He+ to fluences of 8.4 × 1021 and 5.0 × 1022 He/m2 at temperatures of 920, 1020, and 1120 K in the Materials Irradiation Experiment (MITE-E) at the University of Wisconsin Inertial Electrostatic Confinement (UW-IEC) Laboratory to simulate some of the conditions of plasma-facing components in fusion reactors. The samples irradiated to the higher fluence developed surface morphology changes in the ion irradiated zone including rough, porous, and ripple structures. The ZrB2 had similar mass loss as W irradiated to similar conditions. Additionally, the ZrB2 samples did not exhibit flaking as did the SiC samples previously irradiated to similar conditions. This first look at ZrB2 behavior under ion irradiation is promising and justifies further testing of this emerging ultra-high temperature ceramic material for fusion applications.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 112-125 |
Number of pages | 14 |
Journal | Journal of Nuclear Materials |
Volume | 507 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Aug 15 2018 |
Funding
This research is supported in part by the U.S. Department of Energy (U.S. DOE) , under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with UT-Battelle, LLC and also the U.S. DOE Office of Science Graduate Fellowship Program, made possible in part by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which is administered by ORISE–ORAU under contract no. DE-AC05-06OR23100 . Additional financial support was provided by the University of Wisconsin-Madison , the Grainger Foundation, and the Greatbatch Foundation. The authors thank Carlos Castano at Missouri University of Science and Technology for coordinating the exchange of samples used in these experiments and the UW-IEC team for their assistance. Jeremy Mettler, Phil Edmondson, and Yutai Katoh are thanked for their aid with the manuscript.
Keywords
- Helium ion irradiation
- High heat flux
- Plasma-facing material
- Plasma-material interaction
- Ultra-high temperature ceramic