Improving plasticity of the Zr 46 Cu 46 Al 8 bulk metallic glass via thermal rejuvenation

The effect of cryogenic thermal cycling on aging, rejuvenation, and mechanical properties of metallic glasses

“…Remarkably, recent experimental studies on metallic glasses have demonstrated that cryogenic thermal cycling can induce rejuvenation that leads to less relaxed states of higher energy and improved plasticity [4][5][6][7][8]. It was argued that atomic-scale structural rejuvenation upon thermal cycling might be caused by internal stresses that arise due to spatially heterogeneous thermal expansion of the amorphous material [9].…”

Potential energy states and mechanical properties of thermally cycled binary glasses

“…In recent years, a number of methods were proposed to enhance plasticity of metallic glasses, such as addition of chemical heterogeneities [5,6] or a soft second phase [7]. A less intrusive way to tune the amorphous structure is to apply cryogenic thermal cycling that can induce rejuvenation due to heterogeneity in the local thermal expansion and therefore improve plasticity [8][9][10][11][12][13]. Using atomistic simulations, it was recently shown that internal stresses due to thermal expansion can in principle trigger a plastic event in sufficiently large systems [14].…”

Elasto-plastic behavior of amorphous materials: a brief review

“…At finite temperatures [26] or under high frequency acoustic waves [27], some metallic glasses can even exhibit superplasticity, with up to 160% plastic flow strain without breaking, at centimeter scales. Plasticity may also result from the accumulation of shear bands [28] and may be increased through thermal treatments [29]. Plasticity is thus far from being negligible in the mechanical response of amorphous materials.…”