The effects of pre-straining and annealing upon grain boundaries in AISI304 austenitic stainless steel were examined. It was found that slight pre-strain annealing at a relatively

low temperature resulted in an excellent intergranular corrosion resistance due to an optimized grain boundary character distribution; that is, a uniform distribution with a high frequency of coincidence-site lattice boundaries and a consequent discontinuity of the random boundary network in the material. The optimum distribution could be formed by introducing low-energy segments into migrating random boundaries, during twin emission and boundary¯boundary grain growth reactions, without the generation of new random boundaries.

Optimization of Grain Boundary Character Distribution for Intergranular Corrosion Resistant 304 Stainless Steel by Twin-Induced Grain Boundary Engineering. M.Shimada, H.Kokawa, Z.J.Wang, Y.S.Sato, I.Karibe: Acta Materialia, 2002, 50[9], 2331-41