Kinetics of crowdion reactions

Abstract

The basic equations which govern diffusion-controlled reactions of crowdions (crowdion-vacancy annihilation, conversion of crowdions to dumbbell interstitials by means of crowdion-crowdion collisions, as well as conversion of crowdions at dumbbells and at impurities) are derived. ‘Off-line’ crowdions, which are unable to recombine with their ‘own’ vacancies, as well as ‘on-line’ crowdions, which anneal out preferentially in that way, are taken into account. Approaches to the solution of these equations are presented and compared with those found in the literature. In particular, an expression that was fitted successfully by Frank, Seeger, and. Schottky to the Corbett-Smith-Walker annealing data in stage I_E of electron-irradiated copper is rederived from the basic equations as an approximate solution for the regime of uncorrelated recovery. This means that the annealing kinetics in stage I_E of electron-irradiated copper may be explained in terms of the conversion-two-interstitial model.