Refractory high entropy alloys(RHEAs)have drawn much attention for their potential applications in ad-vanced reactors.While improved irradiation resistance to void swelling and helium bubble formation has been frequen...Refractory high entropy alloys(RHEAs)have drawn much attention for their potential applications in ad-vanced reactors.While improved irradiation resistance to void swelling and helium bubble formation has been frequently reported,experimental investigation regarding their early-stage irradiation damage re-mains insufficient,which hinders the understanding of the behavior of point defects and small clusters.Here we select two typical RHEAs with desired mechanical properties,VTaTi and HfNbZrTi,as well as a conventional V-4Cr-4Ti alloy,and compare their irradiation-induced defect production and hardening under a low-dose irradiation to~0.1 dpa.Significant hardening is observed in V-4Cr-4Ti due to the pin-ning of deformation-induced dislocations by the high density of irradiation-induced loops.In contrast,the hardening in VTaTi is much weaker,corresponding well to the greatly reduced defect density.Strikingly,in HfNbZrTi,visible defect clusters are not observed with a Cs-corrected transmission electron microscope in the whole irradiation range,and no hardening effect is detected.Such strong suppression of irradia-tion damage is attributed to the large lattice distortion based on the ab initio calculations and the local chemical fluctuations based on the atomic-scale elemental mappings,which together hinder the mobility of interstitials.Furthermore,minor irradiation softening is evidenced by cross-sectional nanoindentation tests in HfNbZrTi,which is considered to be related to the evolution of short-range orders and interstitial impurities after irradiation.展开更多
基金supported by the National MCF En-ergy R&D Program of China(No.2022YFE03120000)the Na-tional Natural Science Foundation of China(Nos.12375266 and 12435016).
文摘Refractory high entropy alloys(RHEAs)have drawn much attention for their potential applications in ad-vanced reactors.While improved irradiation resistance to void swelling and helium bubble formation has been frequently reported,experimental investigation regarding their early-stage irradiation damage re-mains insufficient,which hinders the understanding of the behavior of point defects and small clusters.Here we select two typical RHEAs with desired mechanical properties,VTaTi and HfNbZrTi,as well as a conventional V-4Cr-4Ti alloy,and compare their irradiation-induced defect production and hardening under a low-dose irradiation to~0.1 dpa.Significant hardening is observed in V-4Cr-4Ti due to the pin-ning of deformation-induced dislocations by the high density of irradiation-induced loops.In contrast,the hardening in VTaTi is much weaker,corresponding well to the greatly reduced defect density.Strikingly,in HfNbZrTi,visible defect clusters are not observed with a Cs-corrected transmission electron microscope in the whole irradiation range,and no hardening effect is detected.Such strong suppression of irradia-tion damage is attributed to the large lattice distortion based on the ab initio calculations and the local chemical fluctuations based on the atomic-scale elemental mappings,which together hinder the mobility of interstitials.Furthermore,minor irradiation softening is evidenced by cross-sectional nanoindentation tests in HfNbZrTi,which is considered to be related to the evolution of short-range orders and interstitial impurities after irradiation.
