Twin-variant reorientation strain in Ni-Mn-Ga single crystal during quasi-static mechanical compression

Abstract

Twin variant reorientation in single crystal Ni-Mn-Ga during quasi-static mechanical compression was studied using in-situ neutron diffraction. The volume fraction of reoriented twin variants for different stress amplitudes were obtained from the changes in integrated intensities of high-order neutron diffraction peaks. It is shown that during compressive loading, ~85% of the twins were reoriented parallel to the loading direction resulting in a maximum macroscopic strain of ~5.5%, which is in agreement with measured macroscopic strain.