Recent progress on understanding the temperature-dependent irradiation resistance ranking among NiFe, NiCoCr, and NiCoFeCr alloys: A review

Abstract

Systematic temperature-effects investigations on damage evolution in ion-irradiated Ni-based concentrated solid-solution alloys (CSAs) are pivotal to provide reliance on their use in nuclear applications. In search of the origin behind the temperature-dependent irradiation resistance ranking among equiatomic NiFe, NiCoCr, and NiCoFeCr alloys, we have compared previously experimental and theoretical published data involving ion irradiation experiments performed on these alloys with new ion channeling results from ion-irradiated NiCoFeCr at 500 K. Moreover, the current results are compared with independent theoretical calculations and relevant TEM results from the literature, which allow us to suggest that the lower migration energy of vacancies in NiCoCr, as compared with those in NiFe and NiCoFeCr, is the reason behind why NiCoCr is no longer outperforming NiFe under ion irradiation above 300 K. Graphical abstract: [Figure not available: see fulltext.].