Metal structures in 4D

Centre for Fundamental Research: Metal Structures in four Dimensions (M4D)

VISION: The aim of the centre is to

- develop techniques that for the first time allows in-situ investigations in 4D (space + time) of the structural evolution taking place inside metals during typical processing such as deformation and annealing at the relevant size and time scale.
- exploit these 4D techniques to address a set of fundamental problems in materials science and metallurgy. In particular focus has been on : i) nucleation, recrystallization and grain growth in metals, ii) polycrystalline deformation and iii) nanostructured metals.

The 4D methods pioneered by the center make it possible to make movies of polycrystal evolution, where for each crystal (grain) one can determine the morphology, orientation, plastic strain, stress and even crystallographic refinement. Millimeter sized samples can be studies with a spatial resolution of 0.5-5 μm and a time resolution of minutes-hours. Dedicated instruments have been established at the synchrotrons ESRF, Grenoble, APS, Chicago, and at PETRA-III, Hamburg.


Examples of work. Left: 3D grain map of β-Ti. Right: Map of grain centers of 1800 grains in steel. Colours denote orientations

The centre is mainly funded by the Danish National Research Foundation, but additional funds have been obtained from EU (Adventure), US Navy (DARPA), Germany (BMBF), Danish National Science Research Council (SNF, FNU), Danish Energy Agency (EUDP), Danish Agency for Science & Technology (PhD school), DANIDA, Nippon Steel and from innovation grants.

Address:
Center For Fundamental Research: Metal Structures In Four Dimensions
Materials Research Division
Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy
Technical University of Denmark
DK-4000 Roskilde. Denmark
Phone: +45 4677 5730
Fax: +45 4677 5758