Effect of interstitial and substitution alloying elements on the intrinsic stacking fault energy of nanocrystalline fcc-iron by atomistic simulation study

M Mohammadzadeh and R Mohammadzadeh, APPLIED PHYSICS A-MATERIALS SCIENCE & PROCESSING, 123, 720 (2017).

DOI: 10.1007/s00339-017-1297-3

The stacking fault energy (SFE) is an important parameter in the deformation mechanism of face centered cubic (fcc) iron-based alloy. In this study, the effect of interstitial (C and N) and substitution (Nb and Ti) alloying elements on the intrinsic SFE (ISFE) of nanocrystalline iron were investigated via molecular dynamics (MD) simulation. The modified embedded atom method (MEAM) inter-atomic potential was used in the MD simulations. The results demonstrate a strong dependence of ISFE with addition of interstitial alloying elements but only a mild increase in ISFE with addition of substitution alloying elements in the composition range of 0 < C-Nb, C-Ti < 3 (at%). Moreover, it is shown that alloying of fcc iron with N decreases ISFE, whereas it increases significantly by addition of carbon element 0 < C-C, C-N < 3.5 (at%). The simulation method employed in this work shows reasonable agreement with some published experimental/calculated data.

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