Stress-Driven Evolution: New Simulations Reveal Why Grains in Metals and Ceramics Grow the Way They Do

Grain microstructure simulation

Posted on Quantum Server Networks | July 2025

A fascinating international collaboration led by Prof. Marco Salvalaglio of TU Dresden has unveiled new insights into the fundamental mechanisms behind grain growth in polycrystalline materials such as metals and ceramics. Their latest study, published in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, demonstrates that internal stresses—rather than just interfacial energy—play a critical role in shaping microstructures during material evolution.

This work marks a significant departure from classical models, which typically attribute grain boundary migration and microstructure dynamics to curvature flow and minimization of surface energy. Instead, Salvalaglio’s team used advanced phase-field simulations to reveal how internal mechanical stresses and shear deformations contribute actively to grain growth—a phenomenon referred to as shear coupling.

Grains: The Building Blocks of Materials

Metals and ceramics are typically polycrystalline, meaning they are composed of numerous microscopic grains—tiny crystalline domains that differ in orientation. The size, shape, and orientation of these grains dramatically influence a material's mechanical strength, electrical conductivity, ductility, and failure resistance. A key challenge in materials science has long been understanding how these grains grow and coarsen over time under various conditions.

Historically, theories like the von Neumann–Mullins law have modeled grain growth as a function of surface tension and curvature effects alone. While successful in idealized cases, these models often fall short of explaining experimental data from real-world materials, especially when grain shapes appear non-spherical, or when microstructures display anisotropic behavior.

Stress, Not Just Curvature: A New Paradigm

In the current study, the researchers deployed highly detailed simulations involving roughly 1,000 interacting grains. These phase-field models showed that as grain boundaries migrate, they generate internal stresses within the lattice. These stresses are not merely side effects—they are primary drivers of the observed evolution. The resulting grain shapes deviate from the predictions of purely curvature-based models and instead reflect a complex interplay between thermodynamics and mechanical deformation.

Such findings are not only intellectually intriguing but also technologically significant. "This helps reconcile previously unexplained experimental observations and offers a fundamental revision and update of classical theories," notes Salvalaglio. It turns out that real crystalline materials behave very differently from simpler analogues like foams or emulsions, primarily because they can sustain elastic and plastic deformations.

Implications for Material Design and Beyond

These revelations could transform the way we engineer materials for structural applications, electronic devices, energy systems, and more. From enhancing the toughness of turbine blades to improving the reliability of microelectronics, understanding stress-driven grain evolution can lead to innovations in both manufacturing and materials design.

Looking ahead, the team plans to expand their investigation beyond single-component systems to multi-component alloys and explore additional phenomena such as plastic relaxation inside grains. These efforts may open new doors in controlling microstructural evolution through tailored mechanical environments or thermal processing techniques.

Conclusion

The study not only challenges long-standing paradigms in materials science but also provides a robust theoretical and computational framework for future innovations. It is a testament to how simulation-driven research can bridge the gap between fundamental theory and practical applications in the materials world.

To read the original article and explore the complete findings, visit the official publication here: https://phys.org/news/2025-06-simulations-grains-metals-ceramics.html

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#MaterialsScience #GrainGrowth #Polycrystals #Ceramics #Metals #PhaseField #ComputationalMaterials #Microstructure #EngineeringMaterials #PWmat #QuantumServerNetworks

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