Crystallogeometrical Approach to Stacking-Fault Analysis in Ordered Alloys

Abstract

Stacking faults (SFs) and antiphase boundaries (APBs) in an n-dimensional ordered alloy with arbitrary primitive cell are analysed from the crystallogeometrical standpoint. The general definition of a SF is given based on the concept of the boundary displacement lattice. The method of enumeration of all possible SFs of a given orientation is proposed. Finally, the energy of an unrelaxed SF is written in terms of the pair-potential functions. The proposed method may be implied as an efficient way of energy estimation and structural analysis of SFs.