FIZIKA A 4 (1995) 3, 647-652

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

MECHANICAL STRAIN AND STRUCTURAL PHASE TRANSITION IN SMALL PARTICLES

MAGDY LUČIĆ-LAVČEVIĆ^a and ZVONKO OGORELEC^b
aDepartment of Physics, Faculty of Technology, University of Split, 21000 Split, Croatia
^bDepartment of Physics, Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia

Dedicated to Professor Mladen Paić on the occasion of his 90^th birthday

Received 26 September 1994
Revised manuscript received 19 October 1995

Strain energy as a part of the Gibbs free-energy change during the structural phase transition in small particles has been analysed. A special attention has been paid to the transitions that are characterized by small latent heats and large volume changes (large strains in the crystal lattice). Under the assumption that the dilatation of the nucleus of the phase just in formation causes plastic deformation of the particle, a new expression for the strain energy has been formulated. It shows that this energy may be greatly reduced if particles are sufficiently small.

UDC 536.77
PACS 05.70.Ce

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