Creep deformation due to a viscous grain boundary phase

The creep behaviour of a two-phase material composed of rigid grains embedded in a contiguous viscous matrix is analyzed, using two different models. First, in a mean field treatment, the deformation of a suitably chosen representative region (comprising a rigid spherical grain encapsulated by a viscous boundary phase) is studied. Then, in a second treatment, the deformation of a periodic array of hexagonal grains is analyzed. Both of these …