Short-range order plays an important role in defining the properties and performance of “multi-principal element alloys” (MPEAs), but the way in which this order develops is little understood, making it difficult to control. In a surprising new discovery, a US-based research collaboration has have found that this order exists regardless of how MPEAs are processed. The finding will help scientists develop more effective ways to improve the properties of these materials and even tune them for specific applications, especially those with demanding conditions.
MPEAs are a relatively new type of alloy and consist of three or more components in nearly equal proportions. This makes them very different to conventional alloys, which are made from just one or two principal elements with trace elements added to improve their performance.
In recent years, MPEAs have spurred a flurry of interest thanks to their high strength, hardness and toughness over temperature ranges at which traditional alloys, such as steel, can fail. They could also be more resistant to corrosion, making them promising for use in extreme conditions, such as in power plants, or aerospace and automotive technologies, to name but three.
Ubiquitous short-range order
MPEAs were originally thought of as being random solid solutions with the constituent elements being haphazardly dispersed, but recent experiments have shown that this is not the case.
The researchers – from Penn State University, the University of California, Irvine, the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and Brookhaven National Laboratory – studied the cobalt/chromium/nickel (CoCrNi) alloy, one of the best-known examples of an MPEA. This face-centred cubic (FCC) alloy boasts the highest fracture toughness for an alloy at liquid helium temperatures ever recorded.
Using an improved transmission electron microscopy characterization technique combined with advanced three-dimensional printing and atomistic modelling, the team found that short-range order, which occurs when atoms are arranged in a non-random way over short distances, appears in three CoCrNi-based FCC MPEAs under a variety of processing and thermal treatment conditions.
Their computational modelling calculations also revealed that local chemical order forms in the liquid–solid interface when the alloys are rapidly cooled, even at a rate of 100 billion °C/s. This effect comes from the rapid atomic diffusion in the supercooled liquid, at rates equal to or even greater than the rate of solidification. Short-range order is therefore an inherent characteristic of FCC MPEAs, the researchers say.
The new findings are in contrast to the previous notion that the elements in MPEAs arrange themselves randomly in the crystal lattice if they cool rapidly during solidification. It also refutes the idea that short-range order develops mainly during annealing (a process in which heating and slow cooling are used to improve material properties such as strength, hardness and ductility).
Extreme impacts make metals stronger when heated
Short-range order can affect MPEA properties, such as strength or resistance to radiation damage. The researchers, who report their work in Nature Communications, say they now plan to explore how corrosion and radiation damage affect the short-range order in MPEAs.
“MPEAs hold promise for structural applications in extreme environments. However, to facilitate their eventual use in industry, we need to have a more fundamental understanding of the structural origins that give rise to their superior properties,” says team co-lead Yang Yang, who works in the engineering science and mechanics department at Penn State.
