Microstructural Development of Coherent Tetragonal Precipitates in Magnesium‐Partially‐Stabilized Zirconia: A Computer Simulation

Abstract

A new computer simulation technique for modeling morphological pattern formation during nucleation, growth, and coarsening of coherent misfitting particles is developed. Microstructure evolution during precipitation of tetragonal phase from Mg‐partially‐stabilized cubic zirconia is investigated. Our computer simulation shows that during the initial stage of precipitation, the tetragonal particles formed by homogeneous nucleation display strong alignment along certain crystallographic directions, forming the so‐called “tweed” pattern. During subsequent growth of the spatially correlated nuclei, an alternating band structure is observed, with each individual band consisting of lens‐like‐shaped tetragonal phase particles of the same orientation variant dispersed in the cubic matrix. The particles in the neighboring bands are twin‐related. The microstructures obtained in our computer simulation seem to agree well with the experimental observations.