Analysis validation of a new continuum model for the evolution of grain boundaries in polycrystalline materials

Abstract

To describe the evolution of grain boundaries based on the underlying microscopic mechanisms of line defects (disconnections) and the integrated effects of a diverse range of thermodynamic driving forces, Zhang, et al. in 2017 formulated a continuum equation. We prove the global-in-time existence, uniqueness, and regularity of the weak solution to an initial-boundary value problem for this model. The existence, uniqueness of the stationary solution are also established. Finally, we investigate the large-time behavior of the weak solution of the evolution problem, and show that the solution converges to the stationary solution in a suitable sense. Numerical simulations are carried out to validate the analysis results. The main difficulties in the proof of main theorems are due to a non-local term with singularity, a non-smooth coefficient of the highest derivative associated with the gradient of the unknown, and the special form of free energy which is not uniformly bounded from below. The key ingredients in the proof are the energy method, an estimate for a singular integral of the Hilbert type, Fourier transform of Hilbert transformations, and an estimate with a weight, for time-derivative of the unknown.