Perspectives on Experiments, Modeling and Simu1lations of Grain Growth

Abstract

Grain growth is a process through which the average crystal, or grain size, in a fully crystalline material increases due to curvature driven motion of individual grain boundaries. The average grain size increases as small grains shrink and disappear (see Fig. 1). Grain growth occurs in a very wide range of engineering materials, and because grain sizes affect almost all properties, grain growth must be understood and controlled in order to obtain polycrystalline materials with properties, performance, and reliability required for a wide range of applications. Despite the long understood importance of grain growth, and many attempts to model it, modeling has proven difficult in any but the most simple and quasi-empirical ways [1]. Computer simulation, on the other hand, has proven to be a powerful tool for the study of grain growth and has in fact precipitated improved modeling and improved understandings of experimental results.