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Liquid-like atoms in dense-packed solid glasses

Nature Materials volume 21, pages 1240–1245 (2022)Cite this article

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Abstract

Revealing the microscopic structural and dynamic pictures of glasses is a long-standing challenge for scientists1,2. Extensive studies on the structure and relaxation dynamics of glasses have constructed the current classical picture3,4,5: glasses consist of some ‘soft zones’ of loosely bound atoms embedded in a tightly bound atomic matrix. Recent experiments have found an additional fast process in the relaxation spectra6,7,8,9, but the underlying physics of this process remains unclear. Here, combining extensive dynamic experiments and computer simulations, we reveal that this fast relaxation is associated with string-like diffusion of liquid-like atoms, which are inherited from the high-temperature liquids. Even at room temperature, some atoms in dense-packed metallic glasses can diffuse just as easily as they would in liquid states, with an experimentally determined viscosity as low as 107 Pa·s. This finding extends our current microscopic picture of glass solids and might help establish the dynamics–property relationship of glasses4.

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Fig. 1: Emergence of the fast-relaxation process in MGs on the dynamic mechanical spectra.
Fig. 2: Correlation between the activation energies of fast relaxation and high-temperature liquids.
Fig. 3: Relaxation map from experimental results of a Y68.9Co31.1 MG as a function of the inverse of temperature, illustrating how a deep glassy solid inherits liquid-like atoms from a high-temperature liquid.
Fig. 4: Identification and characterization of liquid-like atoms in Al90La10 MG near r.t. (300 K) by MD simulations.
Fig. 5: Inheritance of string-like diffusion in the Al90La10 system.

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The data supporting the findings of this work are included within the paper and its Supplementary Information files. Extra data are available from the corresponding authors upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant numbers 52192600 (H.Y.B.), 61888102 (H.Y.B.), 11790291 (H.Y.B.), 52031016 (M.Z.L.), 51631003 (M.Z.L.)), the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province (2019B030302010 (H.Y.B.)), the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB30000000 (H.Y.B.)), the National Key Research and Development Plan (2018YFA0703603 (H.Y.B.)) and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2020TQ0346 (F.C.L.), 2021M693372 (H.P.Z.)). We thank W. H. Wang for discussions.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: C. Chang, H. P. Zhang, R. Zhao.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    C. Chang, H. P. Zhang, R. Zhao, F. C. Li, P. Luo & H. Y. Bai

  2. Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    C. Chang, R. Zhao & H. Y. Bai

  3. Department of Physics, Renmin University of China, Beijing, China

    M. Z. Li

  4. Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory, Dongguan, Guangdong, China

    H. Y. Bai

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Contributions

H.Y.B., M.Z.L. and R.Z. conceived the idea and designed the research. C.C. and R.Z. prepared the samples and conducted the DMA experiments. C.C. and F.C.L. performed the nanoindentation experiments. H.P.Z. and M.Z.L. performed numerical simulations. All authors analysed and reviewed the results, and participated in writing the paper. H.Y.B. supervised the project.

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Correspondence to H. Y. Bai.

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Supplementary Figs. 1–13, Discussion and Tables 1–4.

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Chang, C., Zhang, H.P., Zhao, R. et al. Liquid-like atoms in dense-packed solid glasses. Nat. Mater. 21, 1240–1245 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-022-01327-w

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