Lattice Boltzmann models for the grain growth in polycrystalline systems

In the present work, lattice Boltzmann models are proposed for the computer simulation of normal grain growth in two-dimensional systems with/without immobile dispersed second-phase particles and involving the temperature gradient effect. These models are demonstrated theoretically to be equivalent to the phase field models based on the multiscale expansion. Simulation results of several representative examples show that the proposed models can effectively and accurately simulate the grain growth in various single- and two-phase systems. It is found that the grain growth in single-phase polycrystalline materials follows the power-law kinetics and the immobile second-phase particles can inhibit the grain growth in two-phase systems. It is further demonstrated that the grain growth can be tuned by the second-phase particles and the introduction of temperature gradient is also an effective way for the fabrication of polycrystalline materials with grained gradient microstructures. The proposed models are useful for the numerical design of the microstructure of materials and provide effective tools to guide the experiments. Moreover, these models can be easily extended to simulate two- and three-dimensional grain growth with considering the mobile second-phase particles, transient heat transfer, melt convection, etc.