Radiation Effects on Electrical Conductivity of Proton Conducting Oxide Ceramics

Radiation Induced Conductivity (RIC) of proton conducting oxide ceramics (SrCe 0.95 Yb 0.05 O 3-δ ) was studied using 1.8 MeV electrons at an ionization dose rate of 10 Gy/s. The observed RIC was enhanced by an increase of the base conductivity without radiation as the irradiation temperature was increased from 298 to 673 K, due to Radiation Induced Electrical Degradation (RIED). It was found that the degradation rate of the base conductivity was strongly dependent on irradiation temperature and fluence. It was also found that the base conductivity at temperatures above about 433 K did not change due to electron irradiation at the total ionization dose of 2.85 MGy. The result indicates that the radiation effect by the electrons has no influence on protonic or ionic conduction.