  In this study, the microstructure changes of Ti3SiC2 MAX phase material
induced by helium irradiation and evolution with a sequence of different helium
irradiation doses of 5E15, 1E16, 5E16 and 1E17cm-2 at room temperature (RT)
were characterized with grazing incidence X-ray diffraction (GIXRD) and Raman
spectra analysis. The irradiation damage process of Ti3SiC2 can be roughly
divided into three stages according to the level of helium irradiation dose:
(1) for a low damage dose, only crystal and damaged Ti3SiC2 exit; (2) at a
higher irradiation dose, there is some damaged TiC phase additionally; (3) with
a much higher irradiation dose, crystal TiC phase could be found inside the
samples as well. Moreover, the 450C 5E16cm-2 helium irradiation on Ti3SiC2 has
confirmed that Ti3SiC2 has much higher irradiation tolerance at higher
temperature, which implies that Ti3SiC2 could be a potential future structural
and fuel coating material working at high temperature environments.
