PNNL

Abstract

The objective of this research is to understand how grain boundary character influences formation of vacancies and interstitials to grain boundaries in BCC Fe. In this study, molecular statics simulations were used to obtain a large number of minimum energy grain boundary structures in the and symmetric tilt grain boundary system. Then, simulations were used to calculate the formation energies associated with vacancies and self-interstitial atoms at atomic positions within 20 Angstroms of the boundary. As a first analysis, the vacancy formation energies are examined here. The simulation results show how the vacancy formation energies are influenced by grain boundary structure. Low angle boundaries are found to be an effective sink for vacancies along planes adjacent to grain boundary dislocations, while high angle low sigma grain boundaries are less effective sinks for vacancies. The grain boundary sink strength is postulated to depend upon the minimum vacancy formation energy and the influence of grain boundary character on this is shown. Interestingly, low sigma boundaries in the symmetric tilt grain boundary system have higher minimum vacancy formation energies, while this quantity does not seem to be influenced by misorientation angle or grain boundary energy. The significance of this research is that atomistic simulations of this kind may ultimately help inform damage evolution via grain boundaries in multiscale models for irradiated materials as well as its implications for grain boundary engineering.