Radiation induced phenomena on electronic and protonic conductions of compact hydride-electrolyte fuel cell

Abstract

Electrical and protonic properties of Ytterbium-doped perovskite-type strontium-cerium oxide ceramics (SrCe0.95Yb0.05 O3-δ) including hydrogen (H), implanted with 10 keV H2+ ions into zirconium film deposited on the one side only of the specimen, were investigated under a fission reactor irradiation. It was found that the radiation induced conductivity (RIC) for the specimen with H at 0.5 kGy/s was higher by about two orders of magnitude than the base conductivity without radiation at 0 Gy/s, and higher than that without H. The RIC is attributed to the electronic excitation as well as enhanced diffusion of hydrogen due to ionizing irradiation. Also, the RIC with H greatly depended on the irradiation temperature and hardly change with the fast neutron fluence, while that without H reduced with increasing the fluence. The fluence dependence on the radiation enhanced diffusion of H shows that the radiation induced defects, produced by neutron collisions, and the radiolysis have no influence on the protonic conduction. © 2007 Springer.