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Letter

Nature Materials 5, 946–949 (1 December 2006) | doi:10.1038/nmat1780

Length scales in alloy dissolution and measurement of absolute interfacial free|[nbsp]|energy

J. Rugolo , J. Erlebacher & K. Sieradzki

De-alloying is the selective dissolution of one or more of the elemental components of an alloy. In binary alloys that exhibit complete solid solubility, de-alloying of the less noble component results in the formation of nanoporous metals, a materials class that has attracted attention for applications such as catalysis, sensing and actuation.