A general model to calculate coherent solid/solid and immiscible liquid/liquid interfacial energies

Abstract Interfacial energy plays a significant role in the microstructure evolution of materials. A general model for predicting both coherent solid/solid and immiscible liquid/liquid interfacial energies is derived from a thermodynamic point of view. In this model, the interfacial energy can be calculated only using the data about molar area and Gibbs energies of two bulk phases and interface phase. The present model is applied to the coherent solid/solid interfacial energies in the Al–Ni, Ni–Ge, Ni–Ga, Ni–Si, Ni–Ti, Au–Ni and Ni–Cr–Al systems. The model-predicted interfacial energies show a reasonable agreement with the literature data. The presently developed model can calculate the interfacial energies between the disordered γ (fcc_A1) and ordered γ’ (fcc_L12) phases, where the Gibbs energies of both γ and γ’ phases are given by the same expression. The previous model in the literature cannot capture some disordered/ordered interfacial energies, like the Al–Ni system. The present model can also be used to calculate the immiscible liquid/liquid interfacial energies in the Al–Pb, Al–In and Al–Bi systems, showing a good agreement with the literature data. These applications validate the reliability of present model in the calculation of coherent solid/solid and immiscible liquid/liquid interfacial energies in the binary and multi-component systems.