We describe system verification tests and early science results from the pulsar processor (PTUSE) developed for the newly commissioned 64-dish SARAO MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa. MeerKAT is a high-gain ( ${\sim}2.8\,\mbox{K Jy}^{-1}$ ) low-system temperature ( ${\sim}18\,\mbox{K at }20\,\mbox{cm}$ ) radio array that currently operates at 580–1 670 MHz and can produce tied-array beams suitable for pulsar observations. This paper presents results from the MeerTime Large Survey Project and commissioning tests with PTUSE. Highlights include observations of the double pulsar $\mbox{J}0737{-}3039\mbox{A}$ , pulse profiles from 34 millisecond pulsars (MSPs) from a single 2.5-h observation of the Globular cluster Terzan 5, the rotation measure of Ter5O, a 420-sigma giant pulse from the Large Magellanic Cloud pulsar PSR $\mbox{J}0540{-}6919$ , and nulling identified in the slow pulsar PSR J0633–2015. One of the key design specifications for MeerKAT was absolute timing errors of less than 5 ns using their novel precise time system. Our timing of two bright MSPs confirm that MeerKAT delivers exceptional timing. PSR $\mbox{J}2241{-}5236$ exhibits a jitter limit of $<4\,\mbox{ns h}^{-1}$ whilst timing of PSR $\mbox{J}1909{-}3744$ over almost 11 months yields an rms residual of 66 ns with only 4 min integrations. Our results confirm that the MeerKAT is an exceptional pulsar telescope. The array can be split into four separate sub-arrays to time over 1 000 pulsars per day and the future deployment of S-band (1 750–3 500 MHz) receivers will further enhance its capabilities.

A nano-sized amorphous layer embedded in an atomic simulation cell was used to study the amorphous-to-crystalline (a-c) transition and subsequent phase transformation by molecular-dynamics computer simulations in 3C–SiC. The recovery of bond defects at the interfaces is an important process driving the initial epitaxial recrystallization of the amorphous layer, which is hindered by the nucleation of a polycrystalline 2H–SiC phase. The kink sites and triple junctions formed at the interfaces between 2H– and 3C–SiC provide low-energy paths for 2H–SiC atoms to transform to 3C–SiC atoms. The spectrum of activation energies associated with these processes ranges from below 0.8 eV to about 1.9 eV.

A focused ion beam system is applied to investigate the dose dependence of the shape of Ge channeling implantation profiles in Si and SiC at two very different dose rates (1011 and 1018 cm-2 s-1), and for implantation temperatures between room temperature and 580 °C. The competing influence of dose rate and temperature observed is explained in terms of intracascade defect relaxation. For the different implantation temperatures, the time scale for defect reduction is estimated. The results obtained for Si are compared with those for SiC.

High-energy, self-ion implantation has been used to form deep gettering layers in Si. Subsequently samples have been contaminated with Cu and subjected to heat treatment. The residual defects act as gettering centres for Cu. The decoration of defects byCu making them detectable by secondary ion mass spectromety analysis. Metastable defect complexes have been detected which, because of their small size, are not directly detectable by other analytical techniques such as transmission electron microscopy and MeV-particle channeling. These defects are probably of interstitial type and have been found mainly midway between the sample and the projected ion range, i.e. around Rp/2. The gettering ability of these small defect complexes may largely exceed that of the post-anneal damage at the projected i.e range, Rp. The results obtained demonstrate that by means of metal gettering the formation, growth and dissolution of very small defect complexes in ion-implanted Si can be studied.