Journal of Materials Science, Vol.34, No.18, 4551-4561, 1999
Structural characterization of grain pattern diversity in parametric space
Grain patterns are characterized by size and shape diversity as reflected by variations in the values of structural parameters ascribed to them. Analysis of the population of grains calls for a global analysis of all the pertinent structural parameters taken together. In this study, algorithms were developed for advanced grain image analysis, unbiased grain size-side measurement and full grain pattern recognition. The correlations of these normalized structural parameters were studied for each topological class and geometrical group, for the grain patterns formed under different nucleation-growth conditions. Relationships between the structural parameters and the grain spatial coordinates are given. This provides a useful approach to investigate the structural inhomogeneity in grain patterns. The results show strong interdependence between the topology, geometry and physical dynamics of the spherulitic grain size-shape arrangement in semi-crystalline polymeric films.