Kinetics of Decomposition in Copper-Cobalt: A Time-Resolved ASAXS Study

The decomposition kinetics of dilute Cu-Co alloys containing 0.5 at.% Co were investigated by time-resolved anomalous small-angle X-ray scattering (ASAXS). No evidence for the existence of compositional fluctuations preceding the formation of Co precipitates was found. The separated scattering curves of the Co precipitates show `self-similarity'. The results are interpreted in terms of a classical process of decomposition and values of 0.18 J m^-2 for the interfacial energy and 10.9 Å for the critical radius are calculated.