EXPERIMENTAL AND THEORETICAL-STUDY OF HEAVY-ION IRRADIATION PROCESSES IN POLYMER MATERIALS

Due to the fact that the anomalous behaviour of most different physical characteristics in vitreous solids compared with crystalline solids can be described by the action of a system of additional low‐energy excitations, the application of this model to processes in polymer films irradiated with heavy ions, is studied. The irradiated polymer films were etched with simultaneous electrical conductivity measurements. It is shown that the dependence of the radial etching rate on the distance from the trajectory of the heavy ion up to a determined radius can be described by the response function developed from the model of low‐energy excitations. Copyright © 1990 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA