A phase-field model of 2D grain size distribution in ceramics

Normal grain growth is a ubiquitous process in nature playing a central role in many technological applications of materials. Despite the considerable effort devoted to account for its features over the past years, there remain important aspects which are not fully understood. Among them, the mere existence of a grain distribution function for normal grain growth and its mathematical formulation deserves attention. Although it is commonly assumed that lognormal function is the "expected" grain distribution in materials, there are many examples, particularly in ceramics, in which such assumption has revealed to be not correct. An alternative grain size distribution is proposed after phase field model simulations of static and dynamic grain growth. A simple explanation based upon the local grain size correlation is proposed. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.