Simultaneous grain boundary motion, grain rotation, and sliding in a tricrystal

•Continuum thermodynamics of incoherent interfaces with junctions.•Coupled grain boundary motion including triple junctions and relative tangential translation.•Numerical simulations for shape evolution of grains and grain boundaries in a tricrystal.

Grain rotation and grain boundary (GB) sliding are two important mechanisms for grain coarsening and plastic deformation in nanocrystalline materials. They are in general coupled with GB migration and the resulting dynamics, driven by capillary and external stress, is significantly affected by the presence of junctions. Our aim is to develop and apply a novel continuum theory of incoherent interfaces with junctions to derive the kinetic relations for the coupled motion in a tricrystalline arrangement. The considered tricrystal consists of a columnar grain embedded at the center of a non-planar GB of a much larger bicrystal made of two rectangular grains. We examine the shape evolution of the embedded grain numerically using a finite difference scheme while emphasizing the role of coupled motion as well as junction mobility and external stress. The shape accommodation at the GB, necessary to maintain coherency, is achieved by allowing for GB diffusion along the boundary.