A phase-field approach to athermal β → ω transformation

A quantitative phase-field model has been developed to simulate the microstructural evolution during the athermal β → ω transformation in the Zr-Nb alloys by incorporating to a CALPHAD-based thermodynamic description. While reflecting the essential physics of collapse mechanism that leads to displacive β → ω transformation, the simulations appropriately predicted the morphology and orientation of the athermal ω phase upon different quenching processes, and the selective growth of the ω phase subjected to various applied stresses, which are generally hard to observe experimentally.