Blistering and hydrogen retention in poly- and single- crystals of aluminum by a joint experimental-modeling approach

• Published in: Nuclear materials and energy Vol. 20; p. 100675
• Main Authors: Quiros, C., Mougenot, J., Bisson, R., Redolfi, M., Michau, A., Hassouni, K., Lombardi, G.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 01.08.2019; Elsevier
• Subjects: Aluminum; Blistering; Chemical Physics; Hydrogen inventory; Physics; Hydrogen inventory; Aluminum; Blistering
• ISSN: 2352-1791; 2352-1791
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nme.2019.100675

•Use of Aluminum as a proxy for Beryllium.•Studies by experiments and modeling of hydrogen trapping in blisters.•Role of the boundaries in hydrogen trapping studied by comparing single-crystals and poly-crystals. Aluminum samples have been exposed to a hydrogen plasma generated by a low-pressure – high-density microwave reactor. Aluminum has been chosen as a surrogate for Beryllium. The fluence was kept below 4 × 1024 ions/m2, in order to study the first steps of nucleation and growth of surface and bulk defects, i.e. blisters and bubbles. Experimental analyzes and macroscopic rate equation (MRE) modeling on poly- and single- crystals were made to investigate the role played by grains boundaries in the hydrogen retention. Temperature programmed desorption (TPD) on Al poly-crystals revealed the production of aluminum hydrides (alanes) as majority species in the desorption flux. Comparison of microscopy observations for three different single-crystal orientations (〈100〉, 〈110〉 and 〈111〉) allowed to determine preferential orientations able to attenuate the formation of blisters.