Grain Selection through Facetted Crystal Growth
The animation shows the grain structure evolution of a cast ingot from the so-called SOPLIN process for photovoltaic multicrystalline silicon.In the framework of the phase field method each grain is described by its own phase field parameter. Based on the tilt of grain boundaries in respect to the solidification direction some crystallites become overgrown. The number of grains thus decreases with increase in hight. For the underlying kinetic growth model the <100> orientated grains prevail.