MD simulation for binary liquid alloys. Structural, dynamic and physical properties investigations using CMD and AIMD method. Modelling of parameters for many body interactions using MEAM approach.

In that month studies were performed for the aluminum alloy containing zirconium (Al-Zr) with the transmission electron microscope (STEM, HR, analysis phase). Specimens as pre-prepared thin films have been cut from a piece of alloy Al-Zr. The aim was to examine the correctness the heat treatment and the structure of the initial material. TEM studies revealed the existence in the material very small particles of Al3Zr uniformly distributed in the grains.

This month I prepared the paper for the conference "Advanced Materials and Technologies AMT 2013”. The concept of my dissertation and possibility to use the results of research in the medical industry were described in the extended abstract, which will be presented on the Symposium “Materials Science for the industry”. In the reporting month, I also continued analysis of the polyelectrolyte coatings structure by using the ATR – FTIR. I performed a few diffusion experiments. I’ve spent some time on visualization of polyelectrolyte films surface after Impact R tests. Moreover I prepared samples which will be subjected to microcalorimetric analysis. In the further research I would like to focus on cross-linking by genipin.

In the last month I've written an abstract for the ISMANAM'2013 conference
that will be held in June in Torino, Italy. The corresponding poster and
paper will concern methods for identification of symmetric and
quasi-symmetric boundaries. We started to look for more efficient
methods for quantification of mixed boundaries. Until now, we have
distances to the nearest tilt and twist boundaries, which are correct
and very complicated and time-consuming to calculate, and we have
Fortes decomposition which is fast, but unstable.

In February I continued my efforts to shape titanium's microstructure by means of plastic deformation procedure. The plan was to deform both grade 2 and grade 4 titanium in order to obtain some more sample material and with sufficient reproducibility. Unfortunately however, deformation process failed, with two prepared extrusion dies (made of tool steel) broken down during attempts at extrusion of grade 2 titanium. This was not expected, as similar material was previously extruded with success, using the same KoBo process parameters. Subsequent attempts were carried out using extrusion dies made of Inconel alloy (heat treated for high temperature performance), but those also failed during extrusion of grade 2 Ti. Since our titanium seems to be behaving slightly different, compared to one that was successfully extruded, I will try and find out how exactly it is different in means of its microstructure and why is it so hard to deform.