npj Computational Materials (Jul 2017)
Ultra-large-scale phase-field simulation study of ideal grain growth
Abstract
Grain growth: Simulations elucidate statistical behavior Grain growth under ideal conditions is simulated by phase-field simulations in ultra-large time and space scales to elucidate the statistical behaviors. A team led by Tomohiro Takaki at Kyoto Institute of Technology in Japan performed large scale phase-field simulations to study ideal grain growth behavior. The time and space scales used in the simulations are more than ten times larger than those in previous reports, enabling them to reach a true steady-state with a statistically significant number of grains. A comprehensive theoretical description was derived to understand the ideal grain growth behavior based on the simulations. The knowledge provided by these findings may offer a model to understand the effects of complicated factors present in real materials and thus establish a platform to study more realistic grain growth phenomena in the future.