Structural changes of Ti3SiC2 induced by helium irradiation with different doses

Abstract In this study, the microstructure changes of Ti 3 SiC 2 MAX phase material induced by helium irradiation and evolution with a sequence of different helium irradiation doses of 5 × 10 15 , 1 × 10 16 , 5 × 10 16 and 1 × 10 17  cm −2 at room temperature (RT) were characterized with grazing incidence X-ray diffraction (GIXRD) and Raman spectra analysis. The irradiation damage process of Ti 3 SiC 2 can be roughly divided into three stages according to the level of helium irradiation dose: (1) for a low damage dose, only crystal and damaged Ti 3 SiC 2 exit; (2) at a higher irradiation dose, there is some damaged TiC phase additionally; (3) with a much higher irradiation dose, crystal TiC phase could be found inside the samples as well. Moreover, the 450 °C 5 × 10 16  cm −2 helium irradiation on Ti 3 SiC 2 has confirmed that Ti 3 SiC 2 has much higher irradiation tolerance at higher temperature, which implies that Ti 3 SiC 2 could be a potential future structural and fuel coating material working at high temperature environments.