Abstract
The application of automated Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) in the scanning electron microscope, to the quantitative analysis of grain and subgrain structures is discussed and compared with conventional methods of quantitative metallography. It is shown that the technique has reached a state of maturity such that linescans and maps can routinely be obtained and analysed using commercially available equipment and that EBSD in a Field Emission SEM (FEGSEM) allows quantitative analysis of grain/subgrains as small as ∼0.2 μm. EBSD can often give more accurate measurements of grain and subgrain size than conventional imaging methods, often in comparable times. Subgrain/cell measurements may be made more easily than in the TEM although the limited angular resolution of EBSD may be problematic in some cases. Additional information available from EBSD and not from conventional microscopy, gives a new dimension to quantitative metallography. Texture and its correlation with grain or subgrain size, shape and position are readily measured. Boundary misorientations, which are readily obtainable from EBSD, enable the distribution of boundary types to be determined and CSL boundaries can be identified and measured. The spatial distribution of Stored Energy in a sample and the amount of Recrystallization may also be measured by EBSD methods.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
British Standard BS4490:1989, British Standards Institute, London (1989).
E. E. Underwood, “Quantitative Stereology” (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1970).
B. Hutchinson, L. Ryde and E. Lindh, Math.Sci.Eng. A257 (1998) 9.
H. S. Ubhi, P. Holdway, D. Baxter and S. Pitman, DERA, Farnborough (private communication).
F. J. Humphreys, in “Quantitative Microscopy of High Temperature Materials,” edited by A. Strang (Institute of Materials, in press).
A. J. Wilkinson and P. B. Hirsch, Micron 28 (1997) 279.
V. Randle and O. Engler, “An Introduction to Texture Analysis” (Gordon and Breach, Amsterdam, 2000).
M. N. Alam, M. Blackman and D. W. Pashley, Proc. Royal Soc.Lond. A221 (1954) 224.
D. J. Dingley and V. Randle, J.Mater.Sci. 27 (1992) 4545.
V. Randle, “Microtexture Determination” (Institute of Materials, London, 1992).
B. L. Adams, Ultramicroscopy 67 (1997) 11.
D. P. Field, ibid. 67 (1997) 1.
S. I. Wright and B. L. Adams, Metall.Trans 23A (1992) 759.
N. C. Krieger Lassen, D. Juul Jensen and K.Conradsen, Scanning Microsc. 6 (1992) 115.
B. L. Adams, S. I. Wright and K. Kunze, Met.Mat. Trans. 24A (1993) 819.
F. J. Humphreys and I. Brough, J.Microscopy 195 (1999) 6.
D. J. Prior, P. W. Trimby, U. D. Weber and D. J. Dingley, Mineral.Mag. 60 (1996) 859.
A. P. Day and T. E. Quested, J.Microscopy 195 (1999) 186.
J. R. Michael, Microsc.Microanal. 5 (1999) 218.
F. J. Humphreys (2000). VMAP is a suite of programmes developed for quantitative analysis of the EBSD data generated by the HKL Channel acquisition system. It can be made available on request.
Idem., J.Microscopy 195 (1999) 170.
T. Pettersen, G. Heiberg and J. Hjelen, in Proc. ICEM 14, Cancun, Mexico, 3 (1998) 775.
F. J. Humphreys, Y. Huang, I. Brough and C. Harris, J.Microscopy 195 (1999) 212.
J. L. Goldstein, D. C. Joy, A. D. Romig, C. E. Lyman, C. Fiori and E. Lifshin, “Scanning Electron Microscopy and X-ray Microanalysis” (Plenum, New York, 1992).
N. C. Krieger Lassen, J.Microscopy 181 (1996) 72.
A. J. Wilkinson, in Proc. EMAG99. Inst.Phys.Conf.Ser. 161 (1999) 115.
D. J. Prior, J.Microscopy 195 (1999) 217.
K. Kunze, B. L. Adams, F. Heidelbach and H. R. Wenk, in 10th Int Conf. on Textures (ICOTOM10), edited by H. Bunge (Clausthal, Germany, 1993), 1243.
D. J. Prior, A. P. Boyle, F. Brenker, M. Cheadle, A. Day, G. Lopez, G. J. Potts, S. Reddy, R. Spiess, N. E. Timms, P. Trimby, J. Wheeler and L. ZetterstrÖm, American Mineralogist 84 (1999) 1741.
R. T. De Hoff and F. N. Rhines, “Quantitative Microscopy” (McGraw Hill, New York, 1968).
J. K. Mackenzie, Biometrika 45 (1958) 229.
S. I. Wright and U. F. Kocks, in Proc. 11th Int. Conf. on Texture, Xian, edited by Z. Liang (Int Academic Publishers, Beijing), 1 (1996) 53.
D. J. Dingley and D. P. Field, Mater.Sci.Technol. 13 (1997) 69.
R. L. Fullman, Trans.AIME 197 (1953) 447.
Y. Huang and F. J. Humphreys, Acta Mater. 48 (2000) 2017.
W. Yang, B. L. Adams and M. De Graef, in Proc. 11th Int Conf. on Textures (ICOTOM11), edited by J. Szpunar, Montreal, (1999) 192.
B. L. Adams, in Proc. 11th Int Conf. on Textures (ICOTOM11), Montreal, edited by J. Szpunar, (1999) p. 9.
D. Dyson, Proc.Royal Mic.Soc. 35(2) (2000) 147.
X. Huang and D. J. Jensen, in Proc. EBSD Seminar, TMS Fall meeting (2000), in press.
N. C. Krieger Lassen, D. Juul Jensen and K. Conradsen, Acta Crystall. A50 (1994) 741.
M. Humbert, N. Gey, J. Muller and C. Esling, J.App.Cryst. 29 (1996) 662.
F. J. Humphreys, P. S. Bate and P. J. Hurley, J.Microsc. (2000), in press.
M. Kuwahara and S. Eiho, in “Digital Processing of Biomedical Images” edited by K. Preston and M. Onoe (Plenum Press, New York, 1976) p. 187.
P. J. Hurley and F. J. Humphreys, in Proc. 5th Int Conf. on Recrystallization, Aachen, edited by G. Gottstein and D. Molodov (2001), in press.
R. A. Schwarzer and H. Weiland, in Proc. 7th Int Conf. on Textures (ICOTOM7), Zwidjendrecht, edited by C. M. Brackman (Netherlands Soc. for Mats. Sci. 1984), p. 839.
A. Bardal, I. Lindseth, H. E. Vatne and E. Nes, in Proc. 16th Riso Int. Symp, Denmark, edited by N. Hansen et al. (Riso National Laboratory, 1995), p. 261.
N. C. Krieger Lassen, in Proc. 16th Riso Int. Symp, Denmark, edited by Hansen et al. (Riso National Laboratory, 1995), p. 405.
R. A. Schwarzer, Ultramicroscopy 67 (1997) 19.
Q. Liu, ibid. 60 (1995) 81.
F. J. Humphreys and M. Hatherly, “Recrystallization and Related Annealing Phenomena” (Pergamon, Oxford, 1995).
H. J. Bunge, “Texture Analysis in Materials Science” (Butterworth, London, 1992).
R. W. Cahn, in “Processing of Metals and Alloys,” edited by Cahn (VCH, Heinheim, 1991), p. 429.
W. B. Hutchinson, E. Lindh and P. S. Bate, in Proc. 12th Int Conf. on Texture, edited by J. Szpunar (NRC Press, Ottawa, 1999), p. 34.
A. W. Bowen, Mater.Sci.Tech. 6 (1990) 1058.
G. J. Baczynski, R. Guzzo, M. D. Ball and D. J. Lloyd, Acta Mater. 48 (2000) 3361.
P. S. Lee, A. D. Rollett and B. L. Adams, in Proc. ICOTOM12, 1999, p. 21.
Y. Huang, F. J. Humphreys and M. Ferry, Acta Mater. 48 (2000) 2543.
J. Hansen, J. Pospiech and K. Lucke, “Tables for Texture Analysis of Cubic Crystals” Springer-Verlag, Berlin (1978).
F. C. Frank, Metall.Trans. 19A (1988) 403.
W. B. Hutchinson, L. Ryde, P. S. Bate and B. Bacroix, Scripta Mater 35 (1996) 579.
V. Randle, “The Measurement of Grain Boundary Geometry” (Inst. Phys. Publishing, Bristol, 1993).
B. Adams, D. Kinderlehrer, W. W. Mullins, A. D. Rollett and S. Taasan, Scripta Mater. 38 (1998) 531.
C.-C. Yang, A. D. Rollett and W. W. Mullins, in Proc. 21st Riso Int. Symp., Denmark, edited by N. Hansen et al. (Riso National Laboratory, 2000), p. 659.
V. Randle, M. Caul and J. Fiedler, Micros.Microanal. 3 (1997) 224.
V. Randle and C. Hoile, in Proc. Int. conf. on Texture and Anisotropy of Polycrystals, edited by R. Schwarzer (Trans Tech Publishing, Switzerland, 1998), p. 183.
V. M. Segal, Mater.Sci.Eng. A197 (1995) 157.
K. Nakashima, Z. Horita, M. Nemoto and T. G. Langdon, Acta Mater. 46 (1998) 1589.
C. Harris, P. B. Prangnell and X. Duan, in Proc. 6th Int. Conf on aluminium alloys (ICAA6), edited by T. Sato et al. (Toyohashi, Japan) 1 (1998) 583.
F. J. Humphreys, P. B. Prangnell, J. R. Bowen, A. Gholinia and C. Harris, Phil.Trans.Royal Society A357 (1999) 1663.
A. Gholinia, P. B. Prangnell and M. V. Markuchev, Acta Mater. 48 (2000) 1115.
D. G. Brandon, B. Ralph, S. Ranganathan and M. S. Wald, Acta Metall. 12 (1964) 813.
H. Mykura, in “Grain Boundary Structure and Kinetics,” edited by Balluffi (ASM, Ohio, 1980), 445.
D. G. Brandon, Acta Metall. 14 (1966) 1479.
G. Palumbo and K. T. Aust, in “Materials Interfaces,” edited by Wolf and Yip (Chapman and Hall, London, 1992), p. 190.
T. Watanabe, in Proc. 4th Int Conference on Recrystallization, edited by T. Sakai and H. Suzuki, Japanese Institute of Metals, Tsukuba, Japan (1999), p. 99.
V. Randle, “The Role of the Coincidence Site Lattice in Grain Boundary Engineering” (Inst. of Materials, London, 1996).
E. M. Lehockey and G. Palumbo, Mater.Sci.Eng. A237 168.
M. G. Ardakani, N. D'souza, B. Shollock and M. Mclean, Met.Trans A 31A (2000) 2887.
Y. Pan and B. L. Adams, Scripta Metall. 30 (1994) 1055.
P. L. Orsetti Rossi and C. M. Sellars, Acta Mater. 45 (1997) 137.
E. Lindh, B. Hutchinson and P. Bate, in Proc. 10th Int Conf of Textures, 1995. Clausthal-Zellerfeld, Germany, edited by H. J. Bunge (Trans Tech Publications, Switzerland, 1993) p. 1917.
O. Engler, in Proc. 19th Riso Int. Symp. Denmark, edited by J. Carstersen et al. (Riso National Laboratory, 1998), p. 253.
M. P. Black and R. L. Higginson, Scripta Mater. 41 (1999) 125.
S. I. Wright, in Proc. 12th Int. Conf. on Texture, edited by J. Szpunar (NRC Press, Ottawa, 1999), p. 104.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Humphreys, F.J. Review Grain and subgrain characterisation by electron backscatter diffraction. Journal of Materials Science 36, 3833–3854 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1017973432592
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1017973432592