Computer simulations of “realistic” partially anisotropic microstructures statistically similar to real microstructures

An image processing based technique is presented for geometric simulations of anisotropic/partially-anisotropic microstructures that have specified morphological anisotropy via its application to the microstructures of TiB whiskers in a Ti–6Al–4V–1.0B alloy. Simulations utilize realistic complex feature morphologies/shapes and generate microstructures having specified volume fraction, size distribution, morphological anisotropy, two-point correlations, and lineal path probabilities. The micromechanical response of microstructures generated through this technique is compared to the corresponding real microstructure using finite element computations. The methodology can be used to simulate rational virtual microstructures of materials that have not been processed.