Revisiting the Theory of Spinodal Strengthening: Implications for Inhomogeneous Additive and Irradiated Structural Alloys

Abstract Composition fluctuations are commonly observed in additive manufactured alloys, high entropy alloys and irradiated alloys. These fluctuations, which arise due to thermodynamic and/or kinetic factors, influence the mechanical strength of alloys. The classical theory of spinodal strengthening in alloys with coherency stress arising due to the spinodal long-range composition fluctuations has been developed by Cahn, Kato and others. We present the motivations for revisiting Cahn’s theory to account for the concurrent solid solution strengthening in spinodally strengthened alloys by taking into consideration the effect of the solute friction along with the internal coherency stress. We briefly expose the model we developed to achieve the aforementioned aim and discuss some findings.