Effect Of Electron Irradiation On Zr-Cu-Al-Ni Amorphous Alloys

In nuclear and aerospace engineering,materials are exposed to complex environments such as high-energy rays and high-energy particle irradiation.Therefore,the development of materials with excellent radiation resistance is one of the keys to the development of the nuclear industry and aerospace industry.Zrbased amorphous alloys are used as a potential anti-irradiation material due to their excellent glass forming ability,good tensile strength,excellent corrosion resistance and excellent radiation swelling resistance.However,the current mechanism of irradiation effect of amorphous alloys is not fully studied.Based on this,this paper took the amorphous alloys of Zr55Cu30Al10Ni5,Zr52Cu32Al10Ni6,Zr60Cu20Al10Ni10 and Zr62Cu15.5A110Ni12.5 as the research objects,and studied the effects of electron irradiation on their microstructure,thermal behavior,micromechanical properties and electrochemical properties.The effects of electron irradiation doses(10kGy,50kGy,200kGy and 500kGy,respectively)on the microstructure of Zr-Cu-Al-Ni amorphous alloy thin strip were studied.The results showed that the half-height and width of the steamed bun peak increased after electron irradiation,indicating that the microstructure of the amorphous alloy was changed by electron irradiation,and its structural disorder increased.With the increase of irradiation dose,the glass transition temperature and crystallization activation energy decrease,and the amorphous alloy transitions to a high-energy state.The enthalpy of relaxation first increases and then decreases,possibly because the free volume of amorphous alloys undergoes a process from expansion to collapse reduction with the increase of electron irradiation dose.The nanoindentation results showed that the hardness of the amorphous alloy showed a rapid decrease and then slow recovery with the increase of electron irradiation dose,indicating that the amorphous alloy first softened and then hardened due to electron irradiation.In addition,the effect of electron irradiation on the corrosion resistance of amorphous alloy in 3.5wt.%NaCl solution was also studied,and it was found that the corrosion resistance behavior of the alloy was related to the alloy composition and irradiation dose.Through the open-circuit potential,potentiodynamic polarization curve and impedance analysis,it was judged that the corrosion resistance after electron irradiation at the dose of 200kGy was the strongest.The above results show that the atomic structure of Zr-based amorphous alloy changes under electron irradiation,and the disorder first increases and then decreases with the increase of irradiation dose.This work has some inspiration for the study of the performance evolution behavior of amorphous alloys in irradiated environment.