Comments on the interpretation of differential scanning calorimetry results for thermoelastic martensitic transformations: Athermal versus thermally activated kinetics

In a previous article Van Humbeeck and Planes have made a number of criticisms of the authors' recent paper concerning the interpretation of the results obtained by Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) from the Martensitic Transformation of Cu-Al-Ni-Mn-B alloys. Although the martensitic transformation of these shape memory alloys is generally classified as athermal, it has been confirmed that the capacity of the alloys to undergo a more complete thermoelastic transformation (i.e. better reversibility of the transformation) increased with the Mn content. This behavior has been explained by interpreting the DSC results obtained during thermal cycling in terms of a thermally activated mechanism controlling the direct and reverse transformations. When the heating rate increases during the reverse transformation the DSC curves shift towards higher temperatures while they shift towards the lower temperatures when the cooling rate was increased during the direct transformation. Since the starting transformation temperatures (As, Ms) do not shift, Van Humbeeck and Planes state that there is no real peak shift and assume that the DCS experiments were carried out without taking into account the thermal lag effect between sample and cell. On the following line they deduce a time constant, τ, of 60 seconds because the peak maximum shifts. In fact the assumption made by Van Humbeeck and Planes is false