Investigation into the kinetics of ordering of the Au4Zn alloy

The kinetics of ordering of the Au₄Zn alloy is investigated using X-ray diffractometry. It is established that the ordering and growth of domains inside the ordered phase are multistage processes. These processes are characterized by nucleation and growth of the ordered phase. The kinetics of growth of domains involves the nucleation and growth stages, as well as stages in which the crystal lattice axes have preferred or equally probable directions. The stages are more pronounced at low annealing temperatures. The duration of particular stages of the evolution of antiphase domains and their sizes depend on the annealing temperature.