Domain coarsening in viscous sintering as a result of topological pore evolution

• Published in: Journal of the European Ceramic Society Vol. 42; no. 2; pp. 729 - 733
• Main Authors: Okuma, Gaku, Tanaka, Satoshi, Wakai, Fumihiro
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Ltd 01.02.2022
• Subjects: Coarsening; Topology; Viscous sintering; X-ray microtomography; Viscous sintering; Topology; Coarsening; X-ray microtomography
• ISSN: 0955-2219; 1873-619X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jeurceramsoc.2021.10.013

•Domain coarsening is defined as the increase of mean intercept length with densification in sintering.•Decrease of surface area is the origin, as mean intercept length is inversely proportional to specific surface area.•Domain coarsening is common to viscous sintering of glass particles and solid state sintering of crystalline particles.•Topological change of pore channel is related to domain coarsening, which must be distinguished from grain growth. The microstructure evolution in 3D was studied by X-ray microtomography to reveal the relation between topology of pore networks and characteristic length in viscous sintering. The mean intercept length was defined from solid/pore interface for characterizing the length of solid phase and pore phase. The increase of the characteristic length with densification was termed as domain coarsening. The topological pore evolution was analyzed by using genus. The characteristic length increased with decreasing genus in the intermediate stage. The domain coarsening takes place as a natural consequence of pore evolution in viscous sintering, i.e., the decrease of total surface area concurrent with the topological transformations.