Fast low-temperature irradiation creep driven by athermal defect dynamics

The occurrence of high stress concentrations in reactor components is a still intractable phenomenon encountered in fusion reactor design. Here, we observe and quantitatively model a non-linear high-dose radiation mediated microstructure evolution effect that facilitates fast stress relaxation in the most challenging low-temperature limit. In situ observations of a tensioned tungsten wire exposed to a high-energy ion beam show that internal stress of up to 2 GPa relaxes within minutes, with the extent and time-scale of relaxation accurately predicted by a parameter-free multiscale model informed by atomistic simulations. As opposed to conventional notions of radiation creep, the effect arises from the self-organisation of nanoscale crystal defects, athermally coalescing into extended polarized dislocation networks that compensate and alleviate the external stress. The creep behavior of actively cooled alloys exposed to neutron irradiation in fusion reactors is expected to critically affect the operation of reactor components. Here, experiments and simulations of a 16 μm thick tungsten wire exposed to low-temperature irradiation reveal stress relaxation rates far exceeding those associated with thermal creep.