Incommensurateness in nanotwinning models of modulated martensites

Abstract

Martensites, which are the product of diffusionless phase transitions, can form phases with small periodic modulations of crystalline atomic lattice positions. Experiments have shown both that the modulation function is smooth and that when more than one modulation is present they can be incommensurate. These observations have appeared to be inconsistent with nanotwinning models. Here the authors show theoretically that in the case of the ferromagnetic shape memory alloy NiMnGa, the presence of two competing mechanisms favoring different commensurate periodic structures, a result of the interaction between different minima in the energy landscape, can lead to effective smooth incommensurate modulations consistent with nanotwinning models.