Deformation twins stimulated by {11[formula omitted]2} twinning in adjacent grain in titanium

Abstract

Deformation twins are likely nucleated at and impeded by grain boundaries (GBs), developing shear transformation bands. Knowing the accommodated deformation in adjacent grains to the twinning shear is essential for understanding mechanical properties and the evolution of microstructure and texture of polycrystalline aggregates. Based on EBSD analysis, we characterize and statistically group accommodated deformation modes in the neighbor to {112¯2} compression twins (CTWs) in titanium with respect to the misorientation axis/angle. Two types of CTWs are preferably activated in adjacent grains with low misorientation angles, two types of extension twins (ETWs) are favorably activated in adjacent grains with high misorientation angles, and some of {112¯2} CTWs terminate at GBs with high misorientation angles. We discuss the preference of accommodated deformation modes and the selection of twin variants based on the SDGA criterion which couples the displacement gradient accommodation (DGA) and stress driven accommodation (SDA) criteria. Although misorientation angle of GBs is widely used to predict the preferred deformation modes, we demonstrate that misorientation axis that was often ignored, must be considered in determining the preferred deformation modes especially for large misorientation angles. Finally, we predict the misorientation angle/axis pairs with respect to the activity of four twinning modes and two slip systems as the best accommodation mechanism in adjacent grains. The results are useful for the implementation of intergranular deformation mechanisms in multiscale modeling and the design of HCP materials with specific GB characteristics.