Structural materials articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Predicting segregation energies of alloy systems can be challenging even for a single grain boundary. Here the authors propose a machine-learning framework, which maps the local environments on a distribution of segregation energies, to predict segregation energies of alloy elements in polycrystalline materials.

    • Malik Wagih
    • , Peter M. Larsen
    •  & Christopher A. Schuh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Thermal metamaterials are able to produce unconventional physical properties. Here, the authors demonstrate a thermal metamaterial with conductivity that can be continuously tuned over a very large range.

    • Guoqiang Xu
    • , Kaichen Dong
    •  & Cheng-Wei Qiu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Thermal drawing of glass-cladded metal nanowires is limited by fluid instabilities. Hwang et al. show how admixing tungsten carbide nanoparticles to the zinc core of a borosilicate-cladded wire leads to intact fibres over lengths significantly exceeding those of metals with high melting points.

    • Injoo Hwang
    • , Zeyi Guan
    •  & Xiaochun Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The authors investigate 3D-printed tips, based on controlled microstructural architectured materials, as probes for shear-mode atomic force microscopy. They demonstrate that the tailored stiffness and energy-absorbing behaviour of the material are beneficial for improving image quality.

    • Liangdong Sun
    • , Hongcheng Gu
    •  & Zhongze Gu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Anomalous mechanical behaviors provide an opportunity to regulate the functions of materials. Here the authors show that materials with coexisting negative, zero and positive compressibilities can “squeeze” volume compressibility into one direction, and thus stabilize transmission processes under pressure.

    • Xingxing Jiang
    • , Maxim S. Molokeev
    •  & Zheshuai Lin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is desirable yet challenging to develop sustainable structural materials to replace petroleum-based plastics. Here, the authors report a facile assembly method for manufacturing high-performance structural materials with a unique combination of high strength, toughness and stiffness.

    • Qing-Fang Guan
    • , Huai-Bin Yang
    •  & Shu-Hong Yu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The fatigue performance of high strength aluminum alloys is notoriously poor, leading to design limitations for transportation structures. Here the authors design microstructures to exploit the mechanical energy of fatigue to dynamically heal the microstructural weak points and improve the high cycle fatigue life.

    • Qi Zhang
    • , Yuman Zhu
    •  & Christopher Hutchinson

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Work hardening of tungsten in the thermally activated regime is highly orientation dependent. Here, we show that kink-pair nucleation controlled coupled motion of repulsively oriented screw dislocation pairs occurs and leads to an orientation dependent additional plastic slip on unexpected slip systems.

    • K. Srivastava
    • , D. Weygand
    •  & P. Gumbsch

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Additive manufacturing promises a major transformation of the production of high economic value metallic materials. Here, the authors describe a new class of 3D printable superalloys that are amenable to crack-free 3D printing via electron beam melting as well as selective laser melting.

    • Sean P. Murray
    • , Kira M. Pusch
    •  & Tresa M. Pollock

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Coherent twin boundaries in nickel-based superalloys are vulnerable sites for alloy failure in demanding environments. Here, the authors show that the abnormal γ″ precipitation mechanism at twin boundaries is responsible for pronounced strain localisation and subsequent failure.

    • Zhenbo Zhang
    • , Zhibiao Yang
    •  & Michael Preuss

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Observation of a strain-gradient-induced piezoresponse at domain walls remains a challenge. Here, the authors find the piezoelectric response to be enhanced in the ferroelastic domain walls of centrosymmetric tungsten trioxide thin films due to a large strain gradient over a wide width of the wall.

    • Shinhee Yun
    • , Kyung Song
    •  & Chan-Ho Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Glass materials are solid, like crystals, but lack long-range order, whilst the origin of their solidity remains elusive. Tong et al. show that the emergent solidity of glasses is induced by self-organization of percolation of force-bearing network appeared at the non-equilibrium glass transition upon cooling.

    • Hua Tong
    • , Shiladitya Sengupta
    •  & Hajime Tanaka

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The presence of defects in crystalline solids affects material properties, the precise knowledge of defect characteristics being highly desirable. Here the authors demonstrate a machine-learning outlier detection method based on distortion score as an effective tool for modelling defects in crystalline solids.

    • Alexandra M. Goryaeva
    • , Clovis Lapointe
    •  & Mihai-Cosmin Marinica

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Supercooled liquids near the glass transition show remarkable non-Arrhenius transport phenomena, whose origin is yet to be clarified. Here, the authors use GPU molecular dynamics simulations for various binary mixtures in the supercooled regime to show the validity of a quasiuniversal excess-entropy scaling relation for viscosity and diffusion.

    • Ian H. Bell
    • , Jeppe C. Dyre
    •  & Trond S. Ingebrigtsen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Although power laws are observed during nanoindentation and the power-law exponents are estimated to be approximately 1.5-1.6 for face-centered cubic metals, the origin of the exponent remains unclear. In this paper, we show the power-law statistics in pop-in magnitudes and unveil the nature of the exponent.

    • Yuji Sato
    • , Shuhei Shinzato
    •  & Shigenobu Ogata

  • Article
    | Open Access

    High stretchability, low hysteresis and anti-fatigue fracture are essential for hydrogel-based devices but it is rare to achieve. Here the authors demonstrate a hydrogel design using tandem-repeat proteins as the cross-linkers and random coiled polymers as the percolating network which results in high stretchability, low hysteresis and high fracture toughness.

    • Hai Lei
    • , Liang Dong
    •  & Wei Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Better understanding the synergy between radiation and corrosion is necessary to deploy advanced nuclear reactors. Here, the authors contradict the misconception that radiation always results in deleterious effects and show that proton irradiation slows the corrosion of Ni-Cr alloys in 650 °C molten salt.

    • Weiyue Zhou
    • , Yang Yang
    •  & Michael P. Short

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Structural alloys have distinct microstructural features known as twins that are preferential sites for fatigue crack initiation and need to be better understood to mitigate catastrophic failures. Here, the authors show unusually large stress gradients near a twin boundary, using X-ray techniques and modelling.

    • Sven Gustafson
    • , Wolfgang Ludwig
    •  & Michael D. Sangid

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Strong and ductile materials with resistance to both corrosion and hydrogen embrittlement remain rare and yet are essential for hydrogen-propelled industries. Here, the authors show that a CoNiV medium-entropy alloy with face-centered cubic structure fulfils all the above criteria.

    • Hong Luo
    • , Seok Su Sohn
    •  & Dierk Raabe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fabricating and mechanically testing nanoarchitected materials remains a challenge. Here, the authors use colloidal synthesis to fabricate Au-Ag hollow nanoboxes and investigate the effect of either a rough or a smooth nanobox surface on the mechanical properties.

    • Radhika P. Patil
    • , David Doan
    •  & X. Wendy Gu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Propylene production via propane dehydrogenation demands a highly stable catalyst that works without deactivation even at high temperatures. Here, the authors show that single-atom Pt included in thermally stable intermetallic PtGa works as an active and selective catalyst for propane dehydrogenation even at 600 °C for 96 h without deactivation.

    • Yuki Nakaya
    • , Jun Hirayama
    •  & Shinya Furukawa

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Graphene networks have been used to reinforce polymer and ceramic composites, but connecting graphene into a three dimensional network in a metal matrix is challenging. Here the authors use a powder-metallurgy-based strategy to construct a three-dimensional graphene network reinforced copper matrix composite.

    • Xiang Zhang
    • , Yixin Xu
    •  & Chunnian He

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    Time horizons for nuclear materials development and qualification must be shortened to realize future nuclear energy concepts. Inspired by the Materials Genome Initiative, we present an integrated approach to materials discovery and qualification to insert new materials into service.

    • Jeffery A. Aguiar
    • , Andrea M. Jokisaari
    •  & R. Allen Roach

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metal-organic framework glasses are gaining interest, but large samples are difficult to fabricate and mechanical properties are not well understood. Here, the authors use experiments and simulations to assess fracture toughness and flexural strength of a zeolitic imidazolate framework glass.

    • Theany To
    • , Søren S. Sørensen
    •  & Morten M. Smedskjaer

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Body-centred cubic metals rarely show twinning during deformation. Here, the authors use high resolution transmission electron microscopy to show tungsten, a body-centred cubic metal, spontaneously undergoes detwinning when unloaded.

    • Xiang Wang
    • , Jiangwei Wang
    •  & Scott X. Mao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chemical short-range order (SRO) NiCoCr has been proposed to account for its positive stacking fault energy and good mechanical properties. Here, a combination of theory and experiment shows that SRO is of negligible importance in NiCoCr processed by standard methods.

    • Binglun Yin
    • , Shuhei Yoshida
    •  & W. A. Curtin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Aspects of twinning in hexagonal-close-packed crystals remain elusive. Here, the authors directly image twinning in rhenium nanocrystals and show the process is mediated by disconnections on Prismatic│Basal interfaces as the twin initially deviates from its ideal orientation before it is corrected.

    • Yang He
    • , Bin Li
    •  & Scott X. Mao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Prismatic dislocation loops (PDLs) form during the elastic-to-plastic transition of a dislocation-free volume under nanoindentation. Here the authors observe the initial plasticity and burst-like emission of PDLs in Au nanowires by in-situ transmission electron microscopy, elucidating fundamental aspects of the formation process.

    • Subin Lee
    • , Aviral Vaid
    •  & Sang Ho Oh

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    3D printing can allow for the efficient manufacturing of elaborate structures difficult to realise conventionally without waste, such as the hollow geometries of nickel-based superalloy aeronautic components. To fully exploit this method, we must move towards new alloys and processes.

    • Chinnapat Panwisawas
    • , Yuanbo T. Tang
    •  & Roger C. Reed

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Specific titanium alloys combine transformation-induced plasticity and twinning-induced plasticity for improved work hardening. Here, the authors show that these alloys also have an ultra-large fracture resistance and an unexpected fracture mechanism via dynamic recrystallization and local melting in a deformation band.

    • L. Choisez
    • , L. Ding
    •  & P. J. Jacques

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Resin-based-composites are widely used in industry and medicine but the influence of the filler particles on the reactive group conversion in photocurable resins is yet to be elucidated. Here the authors observe reduced local conversion and chemical bond strain in silica filler acrylate composite using synchrotron-based wide-field IR imaging.

    • Slobodan Sirovica
    • , Johanne H. Solheim
    •  & Owen Addison

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here the authors report composite electrolytes combining polymer chains and hydrated salts with a similar bonding structure to that of natural bones. The design breaks the trade-off between strength and ionic mobility of solid electrolytes and allows for good electrochemical performance in supercapacitors.

    • Ziyang Tai
    • , Junjie Wei
    •  & Qigang Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Alloy anode materials in lithium batteries usually suffer from fatal structural degradation due to the large volume change during cycling. Here the authors report a design in which Al foil serves as both anode and current collector to circumvent the strain.

    • Hongyi Li
    • , Takitaro Yamaguchi
    •  & Tetsu Ichitsubo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Flexible materials with mechano-responsive luminescence has gained interest for their potential in sensing devices. Here, the authors demonstrate targeted folding under high compressive strains, which, together with the oxygen quenching of fluorophores, forms the basis for topo-optical sensing.

    • Cong Wang
    • , Ding Wang
    •  & Ben Bin Xu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Though deformable thermoelectric materials are desirable for integrating thermoelectric devices into wearable electronics, typical thermoelectric materials are too brittle for practical application. Here, the authors report a high-performance elastic composite for stretchable thermoelectric modules.

    • Nara Kim
    • , Samuel Lienemann
    •  & Klas Tybrandt

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Exactly how seemingly simple solid-state precipitation occurs in alloys remains elusive. Here, the authors show that excess vacancies introduced into a nanoscale, irradiated or deformed aluminium-copper alloy enable template-directed nucleation of the known strengthening phase θʹ.

    • Laure Bourgeois
    • , Yong Zhang
    •  & Nikhil V. Medhekar

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding the plastic deformation mechanism within specific ranges of temperature and strain in metal alloys is of great technological importance. Here the authors report on dynamic simulations of dislocation–solute coevolution in tungsten crystals containing a few atomic parts per million of interstitial oxygen and their relation to unstable plastic flow.

    • Yue Zhao
    • , Lucile Dezerald
    •  & Jaime Marian

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The deformation mechanisms of micron-sized twinned metals are well-understood, but it is not so for twinned nanocrystalline metals. Here, the authors use high resolution microscopy to image the deformation of nanocrystalline twinned platinum and show that grain boundary behaviors dominate plasticity below 6 nm.

    • Lihua Wang
    • , Kui Du
    •  & Xiaodong Han

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Different self-healing materials were developed in the past but development of mechanically robust and affordable self-healing materials with high strain and stiffness is challenging. Here the authors develop mechanically robust thermoplastic polyurethane fibers and films capable of autonomous self-healing under ambient conditions.

    • Chris C. Hornat
    •  & Marek W. Urban

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Atom probe tomography can image chemical composition at the nanoscale, but our understanding of how it images voids, or empty spaces, is still lacking. Here, the authors combine atom probe tomography, scanning transmission electron microscopy, and field-evaporation theory to show how voids are imaged and subsequently measured.

    • Xing Wang
    • , Constantinos Hatzoglou
    •  & Jonathan D. Poplawsky

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A robust time-controlled energy pumping in a classical metamaterial remains to be achieved. Here, Grinberg et al. demonstrate a temporal topological pump that produces on-demand, robust transport of mechanical energy using a one-dimensional magneto-mechanical metamaterial.

    • Inbar Hotzen Grinberg
    • , Mao Lin
    •  & Gaurav Bahl

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