Structure Refinement and Fragmentation of Precipitates under Severe Plastic Deformation: A Review

During severe plastic deformation (SPD), the processes of lattice defect formation as well as their relaxation (annihilation) compete with each other. As a result, a dynamic equilibrium is established, and a steady state is reached after a certain strain value. Simultaneously, other kinetic processes act in opposite directions and also compete with each other during SPD, such as grain refinement/growth, mechanical strengthening/softening, formation/decomposition of solid solution, etc. These competing processes also lead to dynamic equilibrium and result in a steady state (saturation), albeit after different strains. Among these steady-state phenomena, particle fragmentation during the second phase of SPD has received little attention. Available data indicate that precipitate fragmentation slows down with increasing strain, though saturation is achieved at higher strains than in the case of hardness or grain size. Moreover, one can consider the SPD-driven nanocrystallization in the amorphous phase as a process that is opposite to the fragmentation of precipitates. The size of these crystalline nanoprecipitates also saturates after a certain strain. The fragmentation of precipitates during SPD is the topic of this review.

Pokrovsky-Talapov critical behavior and rough-to-rough ridges of the sigma3 coincidence tilt boundary in Mo

The as-grown shape of the cylindric tilt grain boundary (GB) in Mo bicrystals grown by the floating zone method has been studied with the electron backscattering diffraction method. The seed crystals were misoriented such that the coincidence site lattice (CSL) with lowest possible inverse density of coincidence sites, a Sigma=3 was grown. The flat (100)(Sigma3CSL) facets were observed forming smooth edges (no slope discontinuity) with rounded rough GB portions. Rough GBs curve away from the plane of the (100)(Sigma3CSL) facet as x(beta) with beta=1.69+/-0.07 on one side and beta=1.72+/-0.07 on the other side. Therefore, GB roughening belongs to the Pokrovsky-Talapov universality class. Slope discontinuities between two rounded rough GB portions were also observed. This is the first experimental observation of such first-order rough-to-rough ridges predicted by the Davidson-den-Nijs model.