Structural changes in elastically stressed crystallites under irradiation

The response of elastically stressed iron and vanadium crystallites to atomic displacement cascades was investigated by molecular dynamics simulation. Interatomic interaction in vanadium was described by a many-body potential calculated in the Finnis–Sinclair approximation of the embedded atom method. Interatomic interaction in iron was described by a many-body potential constructed in the approximation of valence-electron gas. The crystallite temperature in the calculations was varied from 100 to 600 K. The elastically stressed state in the crystallites was formed through uniaxial tension by 4–8% such that their volume remained unchanged. The energy of a primary knock-on atom was varied from 0.5 to 50 keV. It is shown that the lower the temperature and the higher the strain degree of an initial crystallite, the lower the threshold primary knock-on atom energy for plastic deformation generation in the crystallite. The structural rearrangements induced in the crystallites by an atomic displacement cascade are similar to those induced by mechanical loading. It is found that the rearrangements are realized through twinning.