High-Performance Materials Simulation
The High-Performance Materials Simulation research group deals with the optimization, modelling and simulation of solidification and sintering processes using the phase field method in large-scale areas.
These are carried out on high-performance computing systems, such as those found at the High-Performance Computing Center in Stuttgart. With the help of the massively parallel solver PACE3D developed at the institute, the simulations on these HPC systems are calculated on several tens of thousands of computing cores. In order to use the HPC systems as efficiently as possible, the group develops highly optimized and vectorized codes for the various calculation models.
In the area of solidification processes, the main focus is on investigating the microstructural development of different multi-component alloys during directional solidification. Eutectic as well as dendritic and coupled eutectic-dendritic growth and the growth of eutectic colonies as a function of different process parameters are investigated.
In the area of sintering processes, the focus is on the simulation of solid-phase sintering from the initial green body to the final compacted end product. The focus here is on modeling and investigating diffusion and compaction processes as well as investigating the influence of pores on microstructure development.
In order to fulfill these research projects, large-scale simulation areas and different tools are required both for the generation of the initial configurations and for the subsequent analysis of the microstructures. The necessary tools are developed by the research group itself. For example, different programs have already been developed and used for the creation of green bodies with defined density, particle size distribution and particle shape or for the evaluation of fiber growth in large-scale solidification simulations.