Faceting transitions in crystal growth and heteroepitaxial growth in the anisotropic phase-field crystal model

We modify the anisotropic phase-field crystal model(APFC),and present a semi-implicit spectral method to numerically solve the dynamic equation of the APFC model.The process results in the acceleration of computations by orders of magnitude relative to the conventional explicit finite-difference scheme,thereby,allowing us to work on a large system and for a long time.The faceting transitions introduced by the increasing anisotropy in crystal growth are then discussed.In particular,we investigate the morphological evolution in heteroepitaxial growth of our model.A new formation mechanism of misfit dislocations caused by vacancy trapping is found.The regular array of misfit dislocations produces a small-angle grain boundary under the right conditions,and it could significantly change the growth orientation of epitaxial layers.     

相场晶体法模拟过冷熔体中的晶体生长

利用相场晶体(phase-field crystal)模型,采用有限差分法,模拟了过冷熔体中晶体生长过程,研究了不同相区、不同过冷度对晶体生长过程的影响.结果表明,在共存区中,随着演化的进行,晶体生长被抑制,液-晶边界层逐渐变厚;在单相区中,随着过冷度的增大,晶态区面积显著增加,液-晶边界层逐渐变薄.晶体生长速度和过冷度成近似线性的关系. 关键词： 相场晶体 自由能函数 过冷熔体 晶体生长     

A phase-field model for simulating various spherulite morphologies of semi-crystalline polymers

A modified phase-field model is proposed for simulating the isothermal crystallization of polymer melts. The model consists of a second-order phase-field equation and a heat conduction equation. It obtains its model parameters from the real material parameters and is easy to use with tolerable computational cost. Due to the use of a new free energy functional form, the model can reproduce various single crystal morphologies of polymer melts under quiescent conditions, including dendritic, lamellar branching, ring-banded, breakup of ring-banded, faceted hexagonal, and spherulitic structures. Simulation results of isotactic polystyrene crystals demonstrate that the present phase-field model has the ability to give qualitative predictions of polymer crystallization under isothermal and quiescent conditions.     

Quantitative phase-field approach for simulating grain growth in anisotropic systems with arbitrary inclination and misorientation dependence

A phase-field approach for quantitative simulations of grain growth in anisotropic systems is introduced, together with a new methodology to derive appropriate model parameters that reproduce given misorientation and inclination dependent grain boundary energy and mobility in the simulations. The proposed model formulation and parameter choice guarantee a constant diffuse interface width and consequently give high controllability of the accuracy in grain growth simulations.     

A phase-field/Monte-Carlo model describing organic crystal growth from solution

In this paper work we present a phase-field/Monte-Carlo hybrid algorithm for the simulation of solutal growth of organic crystals. The algorithm is subsequently used for an investigation of diffusion effects on the growth mechanisms. This method combines a two-scale phase-field model of the liquid phase epitaxial growth and a Monte-Carlo algorithm of the 2D nucleation and thus is faster than previous purely Monte Carlo simulations of crystal growth. The inclusion of supersaturation and diffusion in the method allows the study of crystal growth under various growth conditions. Parameters used in the hybrid algorithm are bound to the energetic parameters of crystal faces, which can be estimated from a detailed study of the actual crystal structure based on a connected nets analysis, which allows the prediction of the shape and morphology of real crystals. The study of the diffusion effect is carried out based on an example of a hydroquinone crystal, which grows from the water solution at various supersaturations. The dependencies of the growth rate and the nucleation rate on the supersaturation indicate the change of the growth mechanism from spiral growth to 2D nucleation. The difference in the growth rate for various faces is in agreement with the crystal morphologies derived from the attachment energy method and observed experimentally. The main result of the simulation is the evaluation of engineering limits for choosing appropriate external process conditions.     

相场法模拟多元合金过冷熔体中的枝晶生长

在二元合金相场模型研究的基础上，进行扩展获得了多元合金相场模型.以Al-Si-Mg三元合金为例，采用该相场模型实现了逼真地模拟多元合金凝固过程的等轴枝晶生长，得到了二次或更高次晶臂生长等复杂的枝晶形貌.随着第三组元Mg含量的减少，枝晶的二次枝晶越发达，枝晶中溶质的偏析越严重，枝晶尖端的生长速率和半径越大，与丁二腈-丙酮体系中枝晶尖端生长速率、半径随溶质浓度变化关系的理论计算和实验结果相符合.另外，枝晶初生晶臂中心的溶质浓度最低，在被二次晶臂包围的界面区域的溶质浓度最高；固液界面区域具有较大的浓度梯度，其中枝晶尖端前沿的梯度最大. 关键词： 相场法 多元合金 凝固过程 枝晶生长     

A phase-field model for elastically anisotropic polycrystalline binary solid solutions

A phase-field model for modeling the diffusional processes in an elastically anisotropic polycrystalline binary solid solution is described. The elastic interactions due to coherency elastic strain are incorporated by solving the mechanical equilibrium equation using an iterative-perturbation scheme taking into account elastic modulus inhomogeneity stemming from different grain orientations. We studied the precipitate interactions among precipitates across a grain boundary and grain boundary segregation–precipitate interactions. It was shown that the local pressure field from one coherent precipitate influences the shape of precipitates in other grains. The local pressure distribution due to primary coherent precipitates near the grain boundary leads to inhomogeneous solute distribution along the grain boundary, resulting in non-uniform distribution of secondary nuclei at the grain boundary.     

相场法模拟对流速度对上游枝晶生长的影响

基于Tong和Beckermann等提出的耦合流场的相场模型,采用有限差分法对纯金属凝固过程进行二维模拟计算,研究了不同对流速度对金属枝晶生长的影响.结果表明：在有对流情况下,上游及下游枝晶呈现不对称形貌,上游枝晶生长速度明显比下游方向生长速度快.随着对流速度的增大,上游尖端过冷度也增大,枝晶生长也越快.这是由于流体速度越大,对上游枝晶冲刷越强,上游枝晶尖端实际过冷度越大,枝晶生长越迅速. 关键词： 相场法 对流速度 上游枝晶     

Sharp interface tracking using the phase-field equation

A general interface tracking method based on the phase-field equation is presented. The zero phase-field contour is used to implicitly track the sharp interface on a fixed grid. The phase-field propagation equation is derived from an interface advection equation by expressing the interface normal and curvature in terms of a hyperbolic tangent phase-field profile across the interface. In addition to normal interface motion driven by a given interface speed or by interface curvature, interface advection by an arbitrary external velocity field is also considered. In the absence of curvature-driven interface motion, a previously developed counter term is used in the phase-field equation to cancel out such motion. Various modifications of the phase-field equation, including nonlinear preconditioning, are also investigated. The accuracy of the present method is demonstrated in several numerical examples for a variety of interface motions and shapes that include singularities, such as sharp corners and topology changes. Good convergence with respect to the grid spacing is obtained. Mass conservation is achieved without the use of separate re-initialization schemes or Lagrangian marker particles. Similarities with and differences to other interface tracking approaches are emphasized.     

Instability of spatially periodic patterns due to a zero mode in the phase-field crystal equation

Weakly nonlinear spatially periodic patterns coupled to a Goldstone (zero) mode of the phase-field crystal model are investigated. Rotationally invariant equations for the dynamics of the amplitudes of a hexagonal pattern are derived first, which then allows us to determine stability regions for stripes and hexagons. There are parameter regimes in which all periodic patterns become unstable as a result of long-wavelength instabilities generated by the zero mode.     

热扰动对过冷熔体中二次枝晶生长影响的相场法模拟

用相场法模拟了过冷纯物质二次枝晶的生长过程，并定量地研究了过冷度、各向异性、热扰动振幅等参数对二次枝晶的影响. 通过加入热扰动，相场法能更真实地模拟过冷熔体中二次枝晶的生长，计算得到的二次枝晶间距和幅值与由Wentzel_Kramers_Brillouin方法得到的结果符合较好. 模拟结果表明，过冷度和各向异性对二次枝晶有较大影响. 当过冷度增大时，二次枝晶间距随之减小；当各向异性增大时，二次枝晶间距随之增大，但二次枝晶幅值则随之减小. 热扰动振幅主要影响二次枝晶幅值，而对二次枝晶间距影响较弱. 关键词： 相场法 热扰动 枝晶生长 二次枝晶     

Efficient thermal field computation in phase-field models

We solve the phase-field equations in two dimensions to simulate crystal growth in the low undercooling regime. The novelty is the use of a fast solver for the free space heat equation to compute the thermal field. This solver is based on the efficient direct evaluation of the integral representation of the solution to the constant coefficient, free space heat equation with a smooth source term. The computational cost and memory requirements of the new solver are reasonable and no artificial boundary conditions are needed. This allows one to solve for the thermal field in a computational domain whose size depends only on the size of the growing crystal and not on the extent of the thermal field, which can result in significant computational savings in the low undercooling regime.     

Provably unconditionally stable,second-order time-accurate,mixed variational methods for phase-field models

We introduce provably unconditionally stable mixed variational methods for phase-field models. Our formulation is based on a mixed finite element method for space discretization and a new second-order accurate time integration algorithm. The fully-discrete formulation inherits the main characteristics of conserved phase dynamics, namely, mass conservation and nonlinear stability with respect to the free energy. We illustrate the theory with the Cahn–Hilliard equation, but our method may be applied to other phase-field models. We also propose an adaptive time-stepping version of the new time integration method. We present some numerical examples that show the accuracy, stability and robustness of the new method.     

晶体相场法模拟异质外延过程中界面形态演化与晶向倾侧

采用晶体相场模型研究了异质外延过程中失配应变与应力弛豫对外延层界面形态演化的影响, 并对由衬底倾角引起的外延层晶向倾侧进行了分析.研究结果表明: 在有一定倾角的衬底晶体上进行外延生长时,若衬底和外延层之间失配度较大 (ε>0.08),外延层中弹性畸变能会以失配位错的形式释放, 最终薄膜以稳定的流动台阶形式生长且外延层的晶向倾角与衬底倾角呈近似线性关系. 而当衬底和外延层之间失配度较小(ε<0.04)不足以形成失配位错时, 外延层中弹性畸变能会以表面能的形式释放,最终使薄膜以岛状形态生长. 在高过冷度条件下,衬底倾角和失配度较大时,衬底和外延层之间会形成由大量位错规则排列而成的小角度晶界从而显著改变外延层的生长位向.     

An extension to the Wheeler phase-field model to allow decoupling of the capillary and kinetic anisotropies

The formulation of the phase-field problem due to Wheeler et al. [Physica D 66, 243 (1993)] has been adopted and extended as a tool for solidification research by many groups around the World. However, an intrinsic problem of this model is that it couples two physically distinct anisotropies, those associated with the surface energy of the solid-liquid interface and attachment kinetics, into a single anisotropy parameter. In this paper we present a simple extension to the Wheeler model in which we show that introducing a complex form of the anisotropy function allows these two physical parameters to be decoupled.Received: 16 June 2004, Published online: 21 October 2004PACS: 81.10.-h Methods of crystal growth; physics of crystal growth - 81.30.Fb Solidification - 64.70.Dv Solid-liquid transitions     

Scale-bridging phase-field simulations of microstructure responses on nucleation in metals and colloids

In the present studies we investigate the connection between atomistic simulation methods, i.e. molecular dynamics (MD) and phase-field crystal (PFC), to the mesoscopic phase-field methods (PFM). While the first describes the evolution of a system on the basis of motion equations of particles the second uses a Cahn–Hilliard type equation to described an atomic density field and the third grounds on the evolution of continuous local order parameter field. The first aim is to point out the ability of the mesoscopic phase-field method to make predictions of growth velocity at the nanoscopic length scale. Therefore the isothermal growth of a spherical crystalline cluster embedded in a melt is considered. We also show simulation techniques that enable to computationally bridge from the atomistic up to the mesoscopic scale. We use a PFM to simulate symmetric thermal dendrites started at an early stage of solidification related to nucleation. These techniques allow to simulate three dimensional dendrites from the state of nuclei (≈50?Å) converted from MD up to a size of some μm where ternary side-arms start to grow.     

Modeling wave propagation in realistic heart geometries using the phase-field method

We present a novel algorithm for modeling electrical wave propagation in anatomical models of the heart. The algorithm uses a phase-field approach that represents the boundaries between the heart muscle and the surrounding medium as a spatially diffuse interface of finite thickness. The chief advantage of this method is to automatically handle the boundary conditions of the voltage in complex geometries without the need to track the location of these boundaries explicitly. The algorithm is shown to converge accurately in nontrivial test geometries with no-flux (zero normal current) boundary conditions as the width of the diffuse interface becomes small compared to the width of the cardiac action potential wavefront. Moreover, the method is illustrated for anatomically realistic models of isolated rabbit and canine ventricles as well as human atria.     

Modeling multiple time scales during glass formation with phase-field crystals

The dynamics of glass formation in monatomic and binary liquids are studied numerically using a microscopic field theory for the evolution of the time-averaged atomic number density. A stochastic framework combining phase-field crystal free energies and dynamic density functional theory is shown to successfully describe several aspects of glass formation over multiple time scales. Agreement with mode coupling theory is demonstrated for underdamped liquids at moderate supercoolings, and a rapidly growing dynamic correlation length is found to be associated with fragile behavior.     

Coupling of the phase-field and CALPHAD methods for predicting multicomponent,solid-state phase transformations

The development of an effective microstructure design method for multicomponent alloys is of considerable importance for improving both the design of alloys and the design of processes for producing alloys with unique properties. The coupling of the phase-field method and the calculation of phase diagrams (CALPHAD) method can be used for predicting the evolution of microstructures in multicomponent alloys. Such predictions make use of CALPHAD thermodynamic information with the chemical free energy function in the phase-field method. This article reviews several of these coupling methods, focusing on solid-state phase transformations in multicomponent systems, such as phase separation and disordered or ordered phase precipitation from a matrix. When calculating disordered phase transformations, the Gibbs energy function derived from the CALPHAD database can be used directly in the phase-field method. On the other hand, when dealing with an order/disorder transition, the degrees of freedom of the element site fraction for an ordered phase in the CALPHAD method can be reduced using the Gibbs energy single formalism for constituent phases, by using a database that stores the Gibbs energy and chemical equilibrium conditions, or by obtaining the driving force calculated using the Thermo-Calc software. The current status and future directions for further development of these coupled methods are discussed.