Since tungsten (W) was considered as the most promising plasma facing materials (PFMs) in fusion reactors, there has been extensive research on the physical performance of W-PFMs.It is found that under the extreme conditions in a fusion reactor, W-PFMs should be in a read more nonequilibrium state of high electronic temperature and low ionic temperature.This leads to the possibility of non-thermal phase transitions, where the crystal structure of the tungsten material may change from body-centered cubic (bcc) phase to hexagonal close-packed (hcp) phase or face-centered cubic (fcc) phase.
Consequently, it is necessary to investigate the relevant physical properties of hcp-W and fcc-W under the electron-excited state.In this work, the fundamental physical properties, including atomic structures, electronic structures, elastic constants, and vacancy formation energies, of bcc-W, hcp-W and fcc-W, were theoretically calculated at various electronic temperatures.The mechanical stability of these three phases was also systematically analyzed under varying electronic temperatures.
The results of this research are expected to provide a certain guidance in merlin wizard costume the optimization of W-PFMs in future fusion reactors.