Open AccessStrengthening mechanism of super-hard nanoscale Cu/Al multilayers with negative enthalpy of mixing
Author(s) -
Qing Zhou,
S. Li,
Ping Huang,
Kewei Xu,
Wang Fei,
Tianming Lu
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
apl materials
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.571
H-Index - 60
ISSN - 2166-532X
DOI - 10.1063/1.4962146
Subject(s) - materials science , nanoscopic scale , stacking , layer (electronics) , molecular dynamics , enthalpy , deposition (geology) , condensed matter physics , chemical physics , crystallography , nanotechnology , thermodynamics , computational chemistry , paleontology , chemistry , physics , nuclear magnetic resonance , sediment , biology
We present unusual high hardness (up to 7.7 GPa) achieved in Cu/Al multilayers relative to monolithic Cu and Al films (∼2 GPa and ∼1 GPa, respectively). Nanotwins and stacking faults (SFs) were proposed to be the main contributors of hardness enhancement, especially when h < 5 nm. Using molecular dynamics simulations of deposition, we demonstrated that intermixing near Cu/Al interface was paramount in stabilizing the SFs in both Cu and Al layers. Our experimental results indicated that the high strength caused by layer intermixing was in sharp contrast to the general belief that only sharp interface structures could strengthen the multilayers
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