Charge transfer and martensitic nucleation

The microsopic interpretation of phase stability in alloys undergoing thermoelastic martensitic transformation involves a difficult nucleation problem. The strong dependence of the critical temperature for the onset of martensite on composition requres the introduction of nonclassical defective nuclei, of dynamic nature, to obtain reasonable estimates of the energy barrier to nucleation. Experimantal data on β-Au-Zn-based alloys are organized in the framework of the atomistic model of the valence electron localization degree