Molecular dynamics simulations of diffusion mechanisms in NiAl Original Research Article

Molecular dynamics simulations of the diffusion process in ordered B2 NiAl at high temperature were performed using an embedded atom interatomic potential. Diffusion occurs through a variety of cyclic mechanisms that accomplish the motion of the vacancy through nearest neighbor jumps restoring order to the alloy at the end of the cycle. The traditionally postulated six-jump cycle is only one of the various cycles observed and some of these are quite complex. A detailed sequential analysis of the observed six-jump cycles was performed and the results are analyzed in terms of the activation energies for individual jumps calculated using molecular statics simulations.