English

Nucleation and growth of second phase precipitates under non-isothermal conditions

Materials Science 2007-05-23 v1

Abstract

The Langer-Schwartz equations for precipitation are formulated to calculate nucleation, growth and coarsening of second phase precipitates under non-isothermal situations. A field-theoretic steady-state nucleation rate model is used in the analysis. The field-theoretic nucleation rate is compared with the classical nucleation rate relation derived from the Fokker-Planck equation. This integrated model is used to simulate a bcc-to-hcp phase quenching and subsequent annealing in the hcp phase of a dilute zirconium alloy, where the mean precipitate size, number density and the degree of supersaturation are calculated as a function of time. The influence of cooling rate on the aforementioned parameters is evaluated. A lower cooling rate results in larger precipitates with a smaller number density in concordance with observations.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0511201,
  title  = {Nucleation and growth of second phase precipitates under non-isothermal conditions},
  author = {A. R. Massih and L. O. Jernkvist},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0511201},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

12 pages, 5 figures, FIG. 4 contains 5 diagrams