ID-IErecovery in electron irradiated copper. II. Theory

A complete diffusional analysis of the low temperature, ID-IE post-irradiation recovery stages in copper is presented here. In applying this analysis to experiments, intrinsic defect characteristics are deduced by multi-parameter, minimum deviation fitting. The vacancy capture radius for interstitials is found to be 3.2 ± 0.3 lattice constants, for example. In addition, the shape of the initial interstitial-vacancy separation distribution function has been determined. A single distribution function describes this distribution for irradiation by electrons with energies greater than 0.6 MeV. At lower energies, the function is narrowed.