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Understanding and controlling low-temperature aging of nanocrystalline materials

Battaile, Corbett C.; Boyce, Brad B.; Foiles, Stephen M.; Hattar, Khalid M.; Padilla, Henry A.; Sharon, John A.

Nanocrystalline copper lms were created by both repetitive high-energy pulsed power, to produce material without internal nanotwins; and pulsed laser deposition, to produce nan- otwins. Samples of these lms were indented at ambient (298K) and cryogenic temperatures by immersion in liquid nitrogen (77K) and helium (4K). The indented samples were sectioned through the indented regions and imaged in a scanning electron microscope. Extensive grain growth was observed in the lms that contained nanotwins and were indented cryogenically. The lms that either lacked twins, or were indented under ambient conditions, were found to exhibit no substantial grain growth by visual inspection. Precession transmission elec- tron microscopy was used to con rm these ndings quantitatively, and show that 3 and 7 boundaries proliferate during grain growth, implying that these interface types play a key role in governing the extensive grain growth observed here. Molecular dynamics sim- ulations of the motion of individual grain boundaries demonstrate that speci c classes of boundaries - notably 3 and 7 - exhibit anti- or a-thermal migration, meaning that their mobilities either increase or do not change signi cantly with decreasing temperature. An in-situ cryogenic indentation capability was developed and implemented in a transmission electron microscope. Preliminary results do not show extensive cryogenic grain growth in indented copper lms. This discrepancy could arise from the signi cant di erences in con g- uration and loading of the specimen between the two approaches, and further research and development of this capability is needed.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2013
OSTIDOI

Peierls potential of screw dislocations in bcc transition metals: Predictions from density functional theory

Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics

Weinberger, Christopher R.; Tucker, Garritt T.; Foiles, Stephen M.

It is well known that screw dislocation motion dominates the plastic deformation in body-centered-cubic metals at low temperatures. The nature of the nonplanar structure of screw dislocations gives rise to high lattice friction, which results in strong temperature and strain rate dependence of plastic flow. Thus the nature of the Peierls potential, which is responsible for the high lattice resistance, is an important physical property of the material. However, current empirical potentials give a complicated picture of the Peierls potential. Here, we investigate the nature of the Peierls potential using density functional theory in the bcc transition metals. The results show that the shape of the Peierls potential is sinusoidal for every material investigated. Furthermore, we show that the magnitude of the potential scales strongly with the energy per unit length of the screw dislocation in the material.

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TYPE Journal Article YEAR 2013
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Comparison of binary collision approximation and molecular dynamics for displacement cascades in GaAs

Foiles, Stephen M.

The predictions of binary collision approximation (BCA) and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of displacement cascades in GaAs are compared. There are three issues addressed in this work. The first is the optimal choice of the effective displacement threshold to use in the BCA calculations to obtain the best agreement with MD results. Second, the spatial correlations of point defects are compared. This is related to the level of clustering that occurs for different types of radiation. Finally, the size and structure of amorphous zones seen in the MD simulations is summarized. BCA simulations are not able to predict the formation of amorphous material.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2011
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Fast neutron environments

Hattar, Khalid M.; Puskar, J.D.; Doyle, Barney L.; Boyce, Brad B.; Buchheit, Thomas E.; Foiles, Stephen M.; Lu, Ping L.; Clark, Blythe C.; Kotula, Paul G.; Goods, Steven H.

The goal of this LDRD project is to develop a rapid first-order experimental procedure for the testing of advanced cladding materials that may be considered for generation IV nuclear reactors. In order to investigate this, a technique was developed to expose the coupons of potential materials to high displacement damage at elevated temperatures to simulate the neutron environment expected in Generation IV reactors. This was completed through a high temperature high-energy heavy-ion implantation. The mechanical properties of the ion irradiated region were tested by either micropillar compression or nanoindentation to determine the local properties, as a function of the implantation dose and exposure temperature. In order to directly compare the microstructural evolution and property degradation from the accelerated testing and classical neutron testing, 316L, 409, and 420 stainless steels were tested. In addition, two sets of diffusion couples from 316L and HT9 stainless steels with various refractory metals. This study has shown that if the ion irradiation size scale is taken into consideration when developing and analyzing the mechanical property data, significant insight into the structural properties of the potential cladding materials can be gained in about a week.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2011
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Nanomechanics and nanometallurgy of boundaries

Boyce, Brad B.; Clark, Blythe C.; Foiles, Stephen M.; Hattar, Khalid M.; Holm, Elizabeth A.; Knapp, J.A.

One of the tenets of nanotechnology is that the electrical/optical/chemical/biological properties of a material may be changed profoundly when the material is reduced to sufficiently small dimensions - and we can exploit these new properties to achieve novel or greatly improved material's performance. However, there may be mechanical or thermodynamic driving forces that hinder the synthesis of the structure, impair the stability of the structure, or reduce the intended performance of the structure. Examples of these phenomena include de-wetting of films due to high surface tension, thermally-driven instability of nano-grain structure, and defect-related internal dissipation. If we have fundamental knowledge of the mechanical processes at small length scales, we can exploit these new properties to achieve robust nanodevices. To state it simply, the goal of this program is the fundamental understanding of the mechanical properties of materials at small length scales. The research embodied by this program lies at the heart of modern materials science with a guiding focus on structure-property relationships. We have divided this program into three Tasks, which are summarized: (1) Mechanics of Nanostructured Materials (PI Blythe Clark). This task aims to develop a fundamental understanding of the mechanical properties and thermal stability of nanostructured metals, and of the relationship between nano/microstructure and bulk mechanical behavior through a combination of special materials synthesis methods, nanoindentation coupled with finite-element modeling, detailed electron microscopic characterization, and in-situ transmission electron microscopy experiments. (2) Theory of Microstructures and Ensemble Controlled Deformation (PI Elizabeth A. Holm). The goal of this Task is to combine experiment, modeling, and simulation to construct, analyze, and utilize three-dimensional (3D) polycrystalline nanostructures. These full 3D models are critical for elucidating the complete structural geometry, topology, and arrangements that control experimentally-observed phenomena, such as abnormal grain growth, grain rotation, and internal dissipation measured in nanocrystalline metal. (3) Mechanics and Dynamics of Nanostructured and Nanoscale Materials (PI John P. Sullivan). The objective of this Task is to develop atomic-scale understanding of dynamic processes including internal dissipation in nanoscale and nanostructured metals, and phonon transport and boundary scattering in nanoscale structures via internal friction measurements.

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TYPE Conference YEAR 2010
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Influence of point defects on grain boundary motion

Foiles, Stephen M.

This work addresses the influence of point defects, in particular vacancies, on the motion of grain boundaries. If there is a non-equilibrium concentration of point defects in the vicinity of an interface, such as due to displacement cascades in a radiation environment, motion of the interface to sweep up the defects will lower the energy and provide a driving force for interface motion. Molecular dynamics simulations are employed to examine the process for the case of excess vacancy concentrations in the vicinity of two grain boundaries. It is observed that the efficacy of the presence of the point defects in inducing boundary motion depends on the balance of the mobility of the defects with the mobility of the interfaces. In addition, the extent to which grain boundaries are ideal sinks for vacancies is evaluated by considering the energy of boundaries before and after vacancy absorption.

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TYPE SAND Report YEAR 2010
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Results 101–150 of 180
Results 101–150 of 180