c-Axis orientation determination of alpha-titanium using Computational Polarized Light Microscopy

摘要

Uniaxial materials such as alpha-titanium exhibit anisotropic optical properties when illuminated using polarized light, i.e., individual grains in a polycrystalline sample reflect different light intensities depending on their orientation. By analyzing the reflected intensities to extract the c-axis orientation of the alpha-titanium grains, orientation mapping can be carried out. We report on a forward model that was developed to predict the observed images formed from the reflection of polarized light from the alpha-titanium sample surface. Compared to electron back-scattered diffraction (EBSD), the Computational Polarized Light Microscopy (CPLM) method is low cost, easy to use, and able to accommodate large samples, making it a technique suitable for high-throughput texture analysis.