Ultra short-time dynamics of radiation damage in fcc metals

Marc Hayoun (1) , Gerrit Coddens (1) , Guillaume Petite (1)

1 LSI - Laboratoire des Solides Irradiés - Irradiated Solids Laboratory

We have performed molecular-dynamics simulations of displacement cascades in copper in order to investigate the non-equilibrium ultra-short time damage and to evaluate the possibility of observing it experimentally in-situ (e.g. in a pump/probe laser experiment). The atomic trajectories have been analysed by calculating their X-ray diffraction patterns as a function of time. The results show that an integrated X-ray intensity can indeed be used to evidence the irradiation effects. Even though the number of Frenkel defects is large, the main effect of the irradiation showing up in the X-ray intensities at ultra-short times is an important alteration of the lattice vibrations. On the basis of these results, a new pump/probe set-up is proposed.

Mots clés: x-ray diffraction; point defects; copper; molecular dynamics

Domaines: Science des matériaux [cond-mat.mtrl-sci]

Marc Hayoun, Gerrit Coddens, Guillaume Petite. Ultra short-time dynamics of radiation damage in fcc metals. 2008. ⟨hal-00325348⟩