Pure bismuth samples were irradiated at 20 K with swift heavy ions from 18O to 238U in the GeV range. The rate of the induced damage was deduced from in situ electrical resistance measurements. Above a threshold in the electronic stopping power Se equal to 24 keV nm-1, the damage is due to electronic slowing down. Above 30 keV nm-1, the electronic slowing down is efficient enough to induce latent tracks attributed to the appearance of a high-resistivity phase. The induced latent tracks radii can be up to 21.9 nm for Se=51 keV nm-1 which is the largest value reported so far for non-radiolytic materials. The evolution with Se of the latent tracks radii is calculated on the basis of the thermal spike model, assuming a realistic value for the electron-phonon coupling constant. A rather good agreement is obtained which supports the idea that the thermal spike could be operative in the observed radiation damage.

We have studied the colour centre production by swift electron and heavy ion irradiations of yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ), i.e. ZrO2:Y with 9.5 mol% Y2O3. For this purpose, we performed irradiations of - or -oriented YSZ single crystals with 2.5 MeV electrons, 145 MeV 13C, 180 MeV 32S, 200 MeV 58Ni, 230 MeV 79Br, 120 MeV 127I, 200 MeV 127I, 200 MeV 197Au, and 2.6 GeV 238U ions. X-band electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) and UV–visible optical absorption measurements were used to monitor the point defect formation. The EPR line saturations were measured between 6 and 150 K, in order to obtain the spin–lattice relaxation time (T1). Electron and ion beams produce the same two colour centres: (i) the first one is identified as an F+-type centre (singly ionized oxygen vacancy) with an axial symmetry, a small g-factor anisotropy ( and ) and long T1 values, (ii) the second one is similar to the well known T-centre (Zr3+ in a trigonal oxygen environment) with an axial symmetry and a large g-factor anisotropy ( and ), which is also produced by photon irradiations. A broad optical absorption band centred at a wavelength near 500 nm is observed with an absorption coefficient proportional to the volume density of the F+-type centre deduced from the room temperature EPR spectra. Since no change of this band occurs between 10 and 300 K, it indicates that the electron–phonon coupling of this colour centre must be strong, in agreement with an F+-type centre. Owing to the axial symmetry and lack of hyperfine structure of the EPR lines of this defect, it is suggested that the first coordination shell must contain one native oxygen vacancy. The plots of the volume density of this centre versus fluence are on the whole rescaled as functions of the number of displacements per atom induced by elastic collisions.

The Elliott relation is a very simple formula relating the parameters of the conduction-electron spinresonance line in pure metals: the square of the g shift must be proportional to the ratio of the spin over momentum relaxation rates. In this paper we test the Elliott relation by considering the available data on Na, K, Rb, Cs, Be, Mg, Pd, Cu, Ag, Au, Al. The fit happens to be surprisingly good.

We analyze the temperature-dependent part of the relaxation rate of conduction-electron spin in simple metals. According to the model of Elliott and Yafet the electron-spin-resonance (ESR) linewidth has the same temperature dependence as the resistivity. We have compared the experimentally measured ESR linewidth of Na, K, Rb, Cs, Cu, Ag, Au, Al, Be; and Mg by scaling it with the inverse of the square of the spin-orbit perturbation and plotting it versus reduced temperature, that is, T/TD, », . A universal, Gruneisen-like curve is indeed followed by the monovalent metals, but large deviations appear in the cases of Al, Mg, and Be. The implications of these behaviors are discussed.