Electrodeposited Al-Mn Alloys with Microcrystalline, Nanocrystalline, Amorphous and Nano-quasicrystalline Structures

• Main Authors: Ruan, Shiyun (Contributor), Schuh, Christopher A (Author)
• Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies (Contributor), Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Materials Science and Engineering (Contributor), Schuh, Christopher A. (Contributor)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V., 2012-03-14T15:42:19Z.
• Subjects: Article
• Online Access: Get fulltext

 Al-Mn alloys with Mn content ranging from 0 to 15.8 at.% are prepared by electrodeposition from an ionic liquid at room temperature, and exhibit a remarkably broad range of structures. The alloys are characterized through a combination of techniques, including X-ray diffraction, electron microscopy and calorimetry. For alloys with Mn content up to 7.5 at.%, increasing Mn additions lead to a decrease in grain size of single-phase microcrystalline face-centered cubic (fcc) Al(Mn). Between 8.2 and 12.3 at.% Mn, an amorphous phase appears, accompanied by a dramatic reduction in the size of the coexisting fcc crystallites to the ∼2-50 nm level. At higher Mn contents, the structure nominally appears entirely amorphous, but is shown to contain order in the form of pre-existing nuclei of the icosahedral quasicrystalline phase. Additionally, nanoindentation tests reveal that the nanostructured and amorphous specimens have very high hardnesses that exhibit complex trends with Mn content.