Hierarchical nanostructure of CrCoNi film underlying its remarkable mechanical strength
Abstract
A CrCoNi medium entropy alloy thin film is fabricated using magnetron sputtering. It exhibits a unique hierarchical nanostructure, featuring (1) a high density of planar defects (mostly stacking faults plus a small number of twin boundaries), (2) a dual-phase configuration (a mix of face-centred-cubic and hexagonal-close-packed), and (3) vertically aligned, textured nanocolumns, each with a width of ∼100 nm. The hierarchical nanostructure in this study is original, especially for its dual phase combination, since the bulk CrCoNi medium entropy alloy generally presents a single phase face-centred-cubic structure. The CrCoNi film shows a hardness quadruple that of its face-centred-cubic structured counterpart. The formation and its role of the hierarchical nanostructure in producing such mechanical strength are discussed.
RAS ID
27905
Document Type
Journal Article
Date of Publication
2018
School
School of Engineering
Copyright
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Comments
Chen, Y., Zhou, Z., Munroe, P., & Xie, Z. (2018). Hierarchical nanostructure of CrCoNi film underlying its remarkable mechanical strength. Applied Physics Letters, 113(8), 081905. Available here