Abstract
Zirconia is viewed as a material of exceptional resistance to amorphization by radiation damage,
and consequently proposed as a candidate to immobilize nuclear waste and serve as an inert nuclear
fuel matrix. Here, we perform molecular dynamics simulations of radiation damage in zirconia
in the range of 0.1-0.5 MeV energies with account of electronic energy losses. We nd that the
lack of amorphizability co-exists with a large number of point defects and their clusters. These,
importantly, are largely isolated from each other and therefore represent a dilute damage that does
not result in the loss of long-range structural coherence and amorphization. We document the nature
of these defects in detail, including their sizes, distribution and morphology, and discuss practical
implications of using zirconia in intense radiation environments.