The glass transition and non-isothermal crystallization
behavior of Ge20Se70Sn10 glass prepared by the
melt-quenching technique was investigated using differential
scanning calorimetry (DSC) at continuous different
heating rates. The structure and surface morphology of asprepared
and annealed samples were characterized using
X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy.
The as-prepared samples showed the amorphous
glassy nature, while the annealed ones are polycrystalline.
Furthermore, XRD phase analysis allowed us to find the
SnSe2, GeSe2, Ge4Se9 and Sn0.5 SeGe0.5 phases in the
annealed samples. According to the value of Avrami index
(n), the crystallization process of studied composition has
more than one crystal growth mechanism. In addition, the
results of DSC showed that the investigated glass has only
a single glass transition and double crystallization stages.
Furthermore, the activation energy of transition as well as
the crystallization has been determined based on different
approximation methods. In addition, the experimental DSC
data of the first and second crystallization peak were
compared with that calculated with the Johnson–Mehl–
Avrami and Sestak–Berggren SB(M, N) model. The results
revealed that the SB(M, N) model is more suitable for
describing the crystallization kinetics of studied glass.