Grain-boundary Au impurity diffusion in S3 (011) Cu bicrystals was studied by using the serial-sectioning technique and 195Au isotopes. The dependence of the grain-boundary diffusion parameter upon the inclination angle of the grain boundary plane, with respect to the close-packed (111) plane of the coherent twin boundary, was determined for temperatures of 673 and 773K. At both temperatures, the grain-boundary diffusion parameter exhibited a minimum at an inclination angle of 70.5º, and a maximum at an inclination angle of 82º. It was shown that there was no direct correlation between the energy and diffusivity of the grain boundaries, and that the periodicity of the grain-boundary plane had an appreciable effect upon the grain-boundary diffusivity.

The Inclination Dependence of Gold Tracer Diffusion along a S3 Twin Grain Boundary in Copper. C.Minkwitz, C.Herzig, E.Rabkin, W.Gust: Acta Materialia, 1999, 47[4], 1231-9