A novel implementation for the simulation of 2-D grain growth with consideration to external energetic fields

A new implementation of the vertex model for the simulation of two-dimensional grain growth is presented. The implementation allows the full consideration of all parameters affecting the motion of the grain boundaries, i.e., grain boundary and triple junction energy as function of grain and grain boundary orientation. The classical Von Neumann-Mullins result and the kinetics are determined and compared with previous works in order to establish the accuracy of the model. The simulated grain growth shows a scaling behaviour with a kinetic time exponent equal to (1)/(2). The deviations from the theoretical values are less than 1%. The implementation also considers the effects of external fields, which influence the total energy of each grain individually. As a first application, the model is used to simulate grain growth under the influence of a magnetic field. The magnetically affected texture evolution and the grain structure are also predicted. The results agree very well with experimental findings on pure polycrystalline titanium. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.