Author:

Abstract:

The crystallization behavior of CaSiO3 in different CaO–Al2O3–SiO2 melts was comprehensively investigated in-situ with a confocal scanning laser microscope (CSLM) and simulated using a phase field model coupled with the FACTSage Toxide thermodynamic database over a wide range of temperatures. The effects of composition and temperature on the crystallization behaviour were studied. In agreement with the observations from in-situ experiments, the simulations show a transition from faceted to dendritic growth with decreasing temperature and the dendritic structure becomes finer when the temperature is decreased further. Moreover, the simulations show that for the considered cases, the Wollastonite morphology is mainly determined by anisotropy in the interface energy and hardly affected by anisotropy in the interface kinetics. The growth rates of different dendrites are time-independent. The growth rates and dendrite tip radii obtained in the simulations agree well with Ivanstov’s theory and are of the same orders of magnitude as those measured experimentally.