Diffusion studies using ion beam analysis

Abstract The combination of ion implantation with nuclear methods such as Rutherford Backscattering Spectrometry (RBS), Nuclear Reaction Spectroscopy (NRS) or Elastic Recoil Detection Analysis (ERDA) has shown to be well adapted to the study of impurity migration in solids induced by either thermal annealing or irradiation. This paper gives some typical examples studied in more detail in our laboratory. Among them, the determination of thermodynamical data (diffusion coefficients, activation energies) from the analysis of the evolution of implanted species is rather classical. As an illustration the diffusion study of lanthanum implanted into apatite using RBS is presented. This work is of interest with regard to nuclear waste storage in geological sites where apatites are possible migration barriers to radioactivity and lanthanum is a representative fission product. The second study taken from the metallurgical field concerns the determination of the nitrogen diffusion coefficient into aluminium using NRS. Finally, a study concerning hydrogen diffusion in an a-SiC:H material (plasma facing materials) induced by deuterium bombardment will be presented. The hydrogen profiling is performed using ERDA.