Bombardment of ?-quartz and related materials by argon (3 MeV) ions

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Abstract
The bombardment using argon ions of energy 3 MeV of several α-quartz isomorphous crystal structures has been carried out. Non-crystalline metamict forms have been obtained in all cases, using relatively low fluence. The metamict damage cross-sections D M obtained are: 3·l±0·3nm2 (GeO2), 2·7 ± 0·3nm2 (FePO4), 1·9 ± 0·4 nm2 (A1PO4), l·0±0·3nm2 (SiO2) and 0·7±0·3nm2 (GaPO4), and these values decrease with increasing melting points. Recrystallization is observed to occur at relatively low temperatures of less than 0·5 T m. These results are in contrast to earlier studies using fast-neutron irradiation, in which non-crystalline forms were obtained only for SiO2. This is probably due to annealing of the neutron damage for materials of lower melting point during the lengthy irradiation at the temperature of the atomic pile.