Thin foils were bombarded with 170MeV Au ions. Defect clusters of vacancy type were observed in foils which had received doses ranging from 5 x 1013 to 1015/m2. The number of vacancy clusters within a cluster group which was formed by primary knock-on atoms varied with the thickness of the film. High-energy primary knock-on atoms were found to increase the number of defect clusters. However, the size distributions of defect clusters were not strongly dependent upon primary knock-on atom energies. Interactions of high-energy cascades resulted in the appearance of new defect clusters near to existing defect cluster groups, in the higher dose range. The dose dependence of the defect cluster density was similar to that observed in 14MeV ion and neutron-irradiated specimens.

High-Energy Cascades in Gold as Studied by High-Energy Self-Ion Irradiation. N.Sekimura, Y.Kanzaki, N.Ohtake, J.Saeki, Y.Shirao, S.Ishino, T.Iwata, A.Iwase, R.Tanaka: Journal of Nuclear Materials, 1999, 271-272, 68-72