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In conventional melting experiments of pure monocrystalline metals, the phase transformation starts at the sample surface and progresses inwards according to thermal gradients. In solutionized alloys, traces of internal melting are usually observed after reheating and quenching from the semi-solid state. The formation and development of these liquid pockets are not fully understood despite their significance in semi-solid processing, where the formability is greatly influenced by the distribution of liquid within the feedstock material. In situ X-ray microtomography was performed in this study to shed light on this phenomenon. We report in detail the melting and isothermal holding of a model binary alloy where a remarkable number of liquid droplets were observed to develop and coalesce. Various computational tools have been used to study their statistical evolution as well as the local ripening mechanisms involved. We analysed an interesting case of particle coarsening which differs from classical case studies by the fact that the fast-diffusing liquid phase is entrapped within the slow-diffusing solid medium.

Efficient simulations of complex physical systems described by partial differential equations (PDEs) require computational methods that can reduce the resource demands without sacrificing the accuracy. Here, we introduce a framework based on graph neural networks for learnable self-supervised differentiable coarsening of unstructured computational grids. We leverage graph-based representation of the physical system and offer a computational grid coarsening method which preserves the underlying physical properties together with the stability of the chosen numerical scheme with the help of the designed loss terms. The coarsening model is trained in a self-supervised way by minimizing the error between the output of the simulations on the coarsened and original grids. We evaluate the approach on four PDE systems of different types, covering both linear and nonlinear regimes, including subsurface flow and wave propagation. We demonstrate that the proposed framework exhibits the ability to maintain high fidelity in simulation outputs even after 95% reduction in the number of nodes, significantly reducing computational overhead. We show that the model exhibits generalizability to unseen scenarios, thereby outperforming the baselines. The generality of the developed framework is also proven by its possibility to adapt to implicit numerical schemes used to model stiff systems of PDEs. Thus, the developed approach demonstrates the ability to accelerate physical simulations without compromising accuracy.

Bajocco S, Dragozi E, Gitas I, Smiraglia D, Salvati L, Ricotta C (2015) Mapping Forest Fuels through Vegetation Phenology: The Role of Coarse-Resolution Satellite Time-Series. PLoS ONE 10(3): e0119811. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0119811 The publisher apologizes for the error. 1. Bajocco S, Dragoz E, Gitas I, Smiraglia D, Salvati L, Ricotta C (2015) Mapping Forest Fuels through Vegetation Phenology: The Role of Coarse-Resolution Satellite Time-Series.

Synthesizing metals with extremely small (nanoscale) grain sizes makes for much stronger materials. However, very small–grained materials start to coarsen at relatively low temperatures, wiping out their most desirable properties. Zhou et al. discovered a way to avoid this problem by mechanically grinding copper and nickel at liquid nitrogen temperatures. The processing method creates low-angle grain boundaries between the nanograins, which promotes thermal stability. Science , this issue p. 526 Low-temperature plastic deformation creates nanoscale metals more resilient to higher-temperature grain coarsening. The limitation of nanograined materials is their strong tendency to coarsen at elevated temperatures. As grain size decreases into the nanoscale, grain coarsening occurs at much lower temperatures, as low as ambient temperatures for some metals. We discovered that nanometer-sized grains in pure copper and nickel produced from plastic deformation at low temperatures exhibit notable thermal stability below a critical grain size. The instability temperature rises substantially at smaller grain sizes, and the nanograins remain stable even above the recrystallization temperatures of coarse grains. The inherent thermal stability of nanograins originates from an autonomous grain boundary evolution to low-energy states due to activation of partial dislocations in plastic deformation.

Microstructures that increase metal crystallite size from nanoscale with surface depth are both strong and ductile Steels can be made stronger, tougher, or more resistant to corrosion either by changing composition (adding in more carbon or other elements) or by modifying their microstructures. An extreme microstructural route for strengthening materials is to reduce the crystallite size from the micrometer scale (“coarse-grained”) to the nanoscale. Nanograined aluminum or copper (Cu) may become even harder than high-strength steels, but these materials can be very brittle and crack when pulled (deformed in tension), apparently because strain becomes localized and resists deformation. However, nanograined metals can be plastically deformed under compression or rolling at ambient temperature, implying that moderate deformation can occur if the cracking process is suppressed. Tremendous efforts have been made to explore how to suppress strain localization in tensioned nanomaterials and make them ductile. Gradient microstructures, in which the grain size increases from nanoscale at the surface to coarse-grained in the core, were recently discovered to be an effective approach to improving ductility ( 1 – 4 ).

Biomolecular condensates organize biochemistry, yet little is known about how cells control the position and scale of these structures. In cells, condensates often appear as relatively small assemblies that do not coarsen into a single droplet despite their propensity to fuse. Here, we report that ribonucleoprotein condensates of the glutamine-rich protein Whi3 interact with the endoplasmic reticulum, which prompted us to examine how membrane association controls condensate size. Reconstitution revealed that membrane recruitment promotes Whi3 condensation under physiological conditions. These assemblies rapidly arrest, resembling size distributions seen in cells. The temporal ordering of molecular interactions and the slow diffusion of membrane-bound complexes can limit condensate size. Our experiments reveal a trade-off between locally enhanced protein concentration at membranes, which favours condensation, and an accompanying reduction in diffusion, which restricts coarsening. Given that many condensates bind endomembranes, we predict that the biophysical properties of lipid bilayers are key for controlling condensate sizes throughout the cell. Snead et al. report that membrane tethering facilitates assembly of ribonucleoprotein condensates while also restricting condensate size by reducing the diffusion of protein and RNA.

During mouse pre-implantation development, the formation of the blastocoel, a fluid-filled lumen, breaks the radial symmetry of the blastocyst. The factors that control the formation and positioning of this basolateral lumen remain obscure. We found that accumulation of pressurized fluid fractures cell-cell contacts into hundreds of micrometer-size lumens. These microlumens eventually discharge their volumes into a single dominant lumen, which we model as a process akin to Ostwald ripening, underlying the coarsening of foams. Using chimeric mutant embryos, we tuned the hydraulic fracturing of cell-cell contacts and steered the coarsening of microlumens, allowing us to successfully manipulate the final position of the lumen.We conclude that hydraulic fracturing of cell-cell contacts followed by contractility-directed coarsening of microlumens sets the first axis of symmetry of the mouse embryo.

Grain boundary formation during coarsening of nanoporous gold (NPG) is investigated wherein a nanocrystalline structure can form by particles detaching and reattaching to the structure. MicroLaue and electron backscatter diffraction measurements demonstrate that an in-grain orientation spread develops as NPG is coarsened. The volume fraction of the NPG sample is near the limit of bicontinuity, at which simulations predict that a bicontinuous structure begins to fragment into independent particles during coarsening. Phase-field simulations of coarsening using a computationally generated structure with a volume fraction near the limit of bicontinuity are used to model particle detachment rates. This model is tested by using the measured NPG structure as an initial condition in the phase-field simulations. We predict that up to ∼5% of the NPG structure detaches as a dealloyed Ag75Au25 sample is annealed at 300 °C for 420 min. The quantity of volume detached is found to be highly dependent on the volume fraction and volume fraction homogeneity of the nanostructure. As the void phase in the experiments cannot support independent particles, they must fall and reattach to the structure, a process that results in the formation of new grain boundaries. This particle reattachment process, along with other classic processes, leads to the formation of grain boundaries during coarsening in nanoporous metals. The formation of grain boundaries can impact a variety of applications, including mechanical strengthening; thus, the consideration and understanding of particle detachment phenomena are essential when studying nanoporous metals.

Proteins that undergo liquid–liquid phase separation (LLPS) have been shown to play a critical role in many physiological functions through formation of condensed liquid-like assemblies that function as membraneless organelles within biological systems. To understand how different proteins may contribute differently to these assemblies and their functions, it is important to understand the molecular driving forces of phase separation and characterize their phase boundaries and material properties. Experimental studies have shown that intrinsically disordered regions of these proteins are a major driving force, as many of them undergo LLPS in isolation. Previous work on polymer solution phase behavior suggests a potential correspondence between intramolecular and intermolecular interactions that can be leveraged to discover relationships between single-molecule properties and phase boundaries. Here, we take advantage of a recently developed coarse-grained framework to calculate the θ temperature Tθ , the Boyle temperature TB , and the critical temperature Tc for 20 diverse protein sequences, and we show that these three properties are highly correlated. We also highlight that these correlations are not specific to our model or simulation methodology by comparing between different pairwise potentials and with data from other work. We, therefore, suggest that smaller simulations or experiments to determine Tθ or TB can provide useful insights into the corresponding phase behavior.

During soldering and service, intermetallic compounds (IMCs) have an important impact on the performance and reliability of electronic products. A thin and continuous intermetallic layer facilitates the formation of reliable solder joints and improves the creep and fatigue resistance of solder joints. However, if the IMCs overgrow, the coarse IMC becomes brittle and tends to crack under stress, leading to a decrease in solder joint reliability. Based on the latest developments in the field of lead-free solders at home and abroad, this paper comprehensively reviews the interfacial reaction between SnAgCu Pb-free solders and different substrates and the growth behavior of IMCs and clarifies the growth mechanism of interfacial IMCs. The effects of the modification measures of lead-free solder on the IMCs and reliability of SnAgCu/substrate interface are analyzed, which provide a theoretical basis for the development and application of new lead-free solder.