Dendritic to globular morphology transition in ternary alloy solidification.

The evolution of solidification microstructures in ternary metallic alloys is investigated by adaptive finite element simulations of a general multicomponent phase-field model. A morphological transition from dendritic to globular growth is found by varying the alloy composition at a fixed undercooling. The dependence of the growth velocity and of the impurity segregation in the solid phase on the composition is analyzed and indicates a smooth type of transition between the dendritic and globular growth structures.