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Radiation-induced modifications in copper oxide growth

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Abstract

Cu samples were irradiated with 10 MeV Au3+ ions at 200 °C to damage levels of 5, 10, and 15 displacements per atom (dpa) as an analogue to study long term self-irradiation effects of alpha-decay in Pu. Samples were then subject to accelerated aging at 350 °C for 1 h in air resulting in mixed oxide layer growth (Cu2O and CuO). Raman spectroscopy revealed that the CuO phase fraction was gradually decreased as the damage level increased. These findings indicate that accumulated damage from self-irradiation causes quantifiable modifications in metal oxidation that could serve as a novel forensic signature.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO) Academic Research Initiative (ARI) under Grant 2015-DN-077-ARI093. The views presented in this paper are those of the authors do not necessarily reflect those of U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS), DNDO, or the ARI. J.L.B and WFC were funded by an Integrated University Program Graduate Fellowship. M.L.C. acknowledges support from the University of Tennessee Governor’s Chair program. Portions of this work were performed at HPCAT (Sector 16), Advanced Photon Source (APS), Argonne National Laboratory. HPCAT operations are supported by DOE-NNSA’s Office of Experimental Sciences. The Advanced Photon Source is a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science User Facility operated for the DOE Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357. HPCAT beam time was provided by the Chicago/DOE Alliance Center. GIXRD was performed at the Joint Institute for Advanced Materials (JIAM) Diffraction Facility, located at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Finally, we thank Dr. Steven Zinkle for his comments and expertise. This work was reviewed and released under LA-UR-20-24516.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Nuclear Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA

    Jessica L. Bishop, Will F. Cureton, John D. Auxier II & Maik Lang

  2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA

    Miguel L. Crespillo

  3. Joint Institute for Advance Materials Diffraction Facility, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, 37996, USA

    Michael Koehler

  4. Chemistry Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, 87545, USA

    Jessica L. Bishop & John D. Auxier II

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  1. Jessica L. Bishop
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  2. Will F. Cureton
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Correspondence to Maik Lang.

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Bishop, J.L., Cureton, W.F., Crespillo, M.L. et al. Radiation-induced modifications in copper oxide growth. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 327, 123–131 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-020-07486-x

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