Developing high-radiation-tolerant inert matrix fuel (IMF) with a long lifetime is important for advanced fission nuclear systems. In this work, we combined zirconia (ZrO₂) with magnesia (MgO) to form ultrafine-grained ZrO₂–MgO composite ceramics. On the one hand, the formation of phase interfaces can stabilize the structure of ZrO₂ as well as inhibiting excessive coarsening of grains. On the other hand, the grain refinement of the composite ceramics can increase the defect sinks. Two kinds of composite ceramics with different grain sizes were prepared by spark plasma sintering (SPS), and their radiation damage behaviors were evaluated by helium (He) and xenon (Xe) ion irradiation. It was found that these dual-phase composite ceramics had better radiation tolerance than the pure yttria-stabilized ZrO₂ (YSZ) and MgO. Regarding He⁺ ion irradiation with low displacement damage, the ZrO₂–MgO composite ceramic with smaller grain size had a better ability to manage He bubbles than the composite ceramic with larger grain size. However, the ZrO₂–MgO composite ceramic with a larger grain size could withstand higher displacement damage in the phase transformation under heavy ion irradiation. Therefore, the balance in managing He bubbles and phase stability should be considered in choosing suitable grain sizes.

Due to the unique outermost orbitals of Sn, hole carriers in tin monoxide (SnO) possess small effective mass and high mobility among oxide semiconductors, making it a promising p-channel material for thin film field-effect transistors (TFTs). However, the Sn vacancy induced field-effect mobility deterioration and threshold voltage (V _th) shift in experiments greatly limit its application in complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) transistors. In this study, the internal mechanism of vacancy defect compensation by aluminum (Al) doping in SnO _x film is studied combining experiments with the density functional theory (DFT). The doping is achieved by an argon (Ar) plasma treatment of Al₂O₃ deposited onto the SnO _x film, in which the Al₂O₃ provides both the surface passivation and Al doping source. Experimental results show a wide V _th modulation range (6.08 to −19.77 V) and notable mobility enhancement (11.56 cm²V⁻¹s⁻¹) in the SnO _x TFTs after the Al doping by Ar plasma. DFT results reveal that the most possible positions of Al in SnO and SnO₂ segments are the compensation to Sn vacancy and interstitial. The compensation will create an n-type doping effect and improve the hole carrier transport by reducing the hole effective mass (m _h*), which is responsible for the device performance variation, while the interstitial in the SnO₂ segment can hardly affect the valence transport of the film. The defect compensation is suitable for the electronic property modulation of SnO towards the high-performance CMOS application.

Developing high-performance tungsten plasma-facing materials for fusion reactors is an urgent task. In this paper, novel nanochannel structural W films prepared by magnetron sputtering deposition were irradiated using a high-power pulsed electron beam or ion beam to study their edge-localized modes, such as transient thermal shock resistance. Under electron beam irradiation, a 1 μm thick nanochannel W film with 150 watt power showed a higher absorbed power density related cracking threshold (0.28–0.43 GW/m²) than the commercial bulk W (0.16–0.28 GW/m²) at room temperature. With ion beam irradiation with an energy density of 1 J/cm² for different pulses, the bulk W displayed many large cracks with the increase of pulse number, while only micro-crack networks with a width of tens of nanometers were found in the nanochannel W film. For the mechanism of the high resistance of nanochannel W films to transient thermal shock, a residual stress analysis was made by Grazing-incidence X-ray diffraction (GIXRD), and the results showed that the irradiated nanochannel W films had a much lower stress than that of the irradiated bulk W, which indicates that the nanochannel structure can release more stress, due to its special nanochannel structure and ability for the annihilation of irradiation induced defects.