Analytical and Scale-Free Phase-Field Studies of $α$ to $ω$ Phase Transformation in Single Crystal Zirconium under Nonhydrostatic Loadings

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Pratoori, Raghunandan, Babaei, Hamed, Levitas, Valery I.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866913837190479872
author Pratoori, Raghunandan
Babaei, Hamed
Levitas, Valery I.
author_facet Pratoori, Raghunandan
Babaei, Hamed
Levitas, Valery I.
contents Zirconium (Zr) is an important engineering material with numerous practical applications. It undergoes martensitic $α$ to $ω$ phase transformation (PT) at pressures that vary from 0.67 GPa to 17 GPa under different loading conditions. Despite numerous experimental and theoretical studies, the effect of the nonhydrostatic stresses is not well understood. To separate the effect of nonhydrostatic stresses from the plastic deformation, a scale-free phase field approach (PFA) for multivariant $α$ to $ω$ PT in a single crystal Zr under general nonhydrostatic loadings is presented. Explicit conditions for the direct and reverse PTs between austenite and martensitic variants and between martensitic variants under general stress tensor are derived and analyzed. In particular, the effect of the deviatoric stresses on the PT pressures is elucidated. It is shown that their effect cannot explain much larger reduction in the transformation pressure observed during plastic flow, i.e., specific mechanisms of strain-induced phase transformations should be involved. Under assumption of the homogeneous fields in the sample, complete analytical solutions that include stress-strain curves during the PT, PT start and finish stresses (i.e., stress hysteresis), and volume fraction of the variants, are determined for different loadings. Finite element method (FEM) solutions are found for the phase field simulations of the microstructure evolution for the same loadings, as well as for two grains of the polycrystalline sample. Macroscopic averaged characteristics of the PFA solutions are well described by an analytical solution, which also simplifies their interpretations. Obtained results are in good qualitative agreement with existing experiments. In addition, some controversies of the previous approaches are analysed.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2505_09570
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Analytical and Scale-Free Phase-Field Studies of $α$ to $ω$ Phase Transformation in Single Crystal Zirconium under Nonhydrostatic Loadings
Pratoori, Raghunandan
Babaei, Hamed
Levitas, Valery I.
Materials Science
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
Zirconium (Zr) is an important engineering material with numerous practical applications. It undergoes martensitic $α$ to $ω$ phase transformation (PT) at pressures that vary from 0.67 GPa to 17 GPa under different loading conditions. Despite numerous experimental and theoretical studies, the effect of the nonhydrostatic stresses is not well understood. To separate the effect of nonhydrostatic stresses from the plastic deformation, a scale-free phase field approach (PFA) for multivariant $α$ to $ω$ PT in a single crystal Zr under general nonhydrostatic loadings is presented. Explicit conditions for the direct and reverse PTs between austenite and martensitic variants and between martensitic variants under general stress tensor are derived and analyzed. In particular, the effect of the deviatoric stresses on the PT pressures is elucidated. It is shown that their effect cannot explain much larger reduction in the transformation pressure observed during plastic flow, i.e., specific mechanisms of strain-induced phase transformations should be involved. Under assumption of the homogeneous fields in the sample, complete analytical solutions that include stress-strain curves during the PT, PT start and finish stresses (i.e., stress hysteresis), and volume fraction of the variants, are determined for different loadings. Finite element method (FEM) solutions are found for the phase field simulations of the microstructure evolution for the same loadings, as well as for two grains of the polycrystalline sample. Macroscopic averaged characteristics of the PFA solutions are well described by an analytical solution, which also simplifies their interpretations. Obtained results are in good qualitative agreement with existing experiments. In addition, some controversies of the previous approaches are analysed.
title Analytical and Scale-Free Phase-Field Studies of $α$ to $ω$ Phase Transformation in Single Crystal Zirconium under Nonhydrostatic Loadings
topic Materials Science
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.09570