An analysis of the stress-induced phase transition and phase coexistence in boracite Cr3B7O13Cl crystals

Abstract

Abstract A crystallographic and mechanical analysis of the effect of external uniaxial stress on the elastic matching and the phase coexistence in single crystals of Cr3B7O13Cl boracite is presented in this paper. A modified algorithm was developed with a view to determining the phase boundary and the domain structure of the two phase coexistence between the cubic 3m and the orthorhombic mm2 phases and between the tetragonal 2m and the mm2 ones, and the 3m/2m/mm2 three phase coexistence. The analytical results give the conditions for the effective stress relieving during the phase coxistence and are in good accordance with the experimental data on the uniaxial stress-induced phase transitions in Cr-Cl boracite.