The Influence of Electronic Stopping on Displacement Damage and the Correction of Effective NIEL Model

B Zhang and T Ying and WQ Li and XD Xu and JQ Yang and XJ Li, IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NUCLEAR SCIENCE, 72, 2130-2136 (2025).

DOI: 10.1109/TNS.2025.3578355

In this article, we utilized molecular dynamics (MD) simulation techniques to study the cascade collision process of the primary knock- on atom (PKA) in silicon (Si), with incident energy ranging from 0.1 to 20 keV. Based on the electron-phonon MD (EPH) model, we investigated the influence of electronic stopping power on defect evolution. The research results indicate that the presence of electron stopping may not only inhibit the formation of defects, leading to a reduction in the number of defects induced by low-energy particles, but also hinder the recombination process of defects, increasing the number of stable defects after high-energy particle irradiation of materials. Based on the Norgett, Robinson, and Torrens (NRT) model and MD simulations, we applied a correction to the effective non-ionizing energy loss (NIEL) model by introducing the athermal recombination corrected (ARC) model. By controlling the physical processes of electron stopping, we have discussed the role of electron stopping in effective NIEL. The numerical calculation results show that our model exhibits a high degree of similarity in trends with traditional analytical methods. In the case of particle incidence at the kiloelectronvolt level, the effect of electron stopping on the calculation of NIEL is particularly significant. Furthermore, we have also found that a higher displacement threshold parameter setting can increase the magnitude of the NIEL values.

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