Role of Defects in Recovery of Radiolytic Damage in Irradiated Potassium Nitrate

Department of Chemistry, Utkal University, Bhubaneswar- 751 004 

The role of lattice defects introduced by doping and crushing In the thermal annealing of \(\gamma\)·irradiated potassium nitrate as well as the effect of crushing in the recovery process of doped (Ba²⁺) crystals has been studied. It is seen that the doped crystals are more susce-ptible to recovery than the pure substance above the temperature of                           

crystal transition \( \begin{array}{c} 400K \\ (rhombic\leftrightharpoons trigonal) \end{array} \). The data show that In both the substances crushing prior to irradiation enhances the rate of recovery, whereas subsequent to irradiation lowers the rate.