On the “Anomalous” hardness of nanocrystalline materials

Densification Kinetics and Structural Evolution During Microwave and Pressureless Sintering of 15 nm Titanium Nitride Powder

Microwave sintering (MWS) of commercially available 15-nm-size nanocrystalline TiN powder was studied. Densification kinetics and grain growth mechanisms of nano-TiN were evaluated using non-isothermal heating up to 1500 °C with variable heating rates. A true nanocrystalline ceramic with ~80-nm-size grains and 94.5 % theoretical density was obtained via MWS consolidation at 1400 °C. At higher temperatures, however, an uncontrolled grain growth and a formation of bimodal microstructure were noticed. A temperature dependence of grain growth suggested grain boundary sliding as a primary mechanism of densification below 1100-1200 °C. An activation energy of nano-TiN densification under MWS varied from 26 ± 3 kJ/mol at the initial stage of sintering (900-1200 °C) to 162 ± 22 kJ/mol at higher temperatures. In addition, a relationship coupling microstructural characteristics (grain size, grain boundary) with mechanical properties of titanium nitride ceramics obtained via both microwave and pressureless sintering techniques was discussed.

Modeling the dependence of strength on grain sizes in nanocrystalline materials

A model was developed to describe the grain size dependence of hardness (or strength) in nanocrystalline materials by combining the Hall-Petch relationship for larger grains with a coherent polycrystal model for nanoscale grains and introducing a log-normal distribution of grain sizes. The transition from the Hall-Petch relationship to the coherent polycrystal mechanism was shown to be a gradual process. The hardness in the nanoscale regime was observed to increase with decreasing grain boundary affected zone (or effective grain boundary thickness, Δ) in the form of Δ-1/2. The critical grain size increased linearly with increasing Δ. The variation of the calculated hardness value with the grain size was observed to be in agreement with the experimental data reported in the literature.