Polymorphic phase transformation rates in shock‐loaded potassium chloride

Single crystals of potassium chloride (KCl) were impacted on quartz stress gauges at velocities ranging from 0.0363 to 0.0755 cm/μsec, producing plane shocks with stress amplitudes between 17 and 31 kbar. Stresses greater than 21 kbar are sufficient to induce a polymorphic phase transformation in KCl. For impact stresses above the phase transition point, the theory of continuum mechanics is used to relate measured stress history at the impact interface to transformation rate between the phases. Experimental results show that, when shocked above the measured dynamic transition pressure of 20.8±0.5 kbar, KCl rapidly transforms to a metastable nonequilibrium mixture of phases. Phase transformation to these initial metastable states proceeds at a rate greater than 500 μsec−1 for shock propagation along the 〈100〉 and 〈111〉 directions, based on the magnitude of initial transformation and the minimum response time of the measuring system. The degree of partial transformation is observed to depend only on impact ...

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