Bulk metallic glasses (BMG) have found many wide and diverse applications in industry, from more durable mobile phones and other electronic equipment to, golf club cases and more recently increasingly durable biomedical applications resulting in implantation into bones, as screws, pins, or plates to fix fractures.
Since the initial surge in commercial interest in BMGs which started in the mid 90's a series of flaws were also beginning to emerge in the material when used particularly in structural applications, such as brittleness, uneven resistance to fatigue, and a complete lack of ductility.
Even though BMGs with their ability to resist corrosion, match steel in terms of strength, yet still be malleable as plastic. BMGs where beginning to look problematic in the construction industry.
That was until the creation of multicomponent bulk metallic glass composites (BMGCs), where the presence of a second phase in the amorphous matrix improves the plasticity of the material. The new breed of BMGCs can be classified according to their processing route, as either in-situ or ex-situ composites.
The in-situ route is by far the more straightforward in processing terms, however the ex-situ yields more freedom in matching and tailoring the overall properties of the materials to their end application.
Researchers in Germany [Shahabi et al. Materials and Design 59, (2014) 241-245] have successfully toughened a bulk-metallic glass with commercially available spring-shaped steel wire by centrifugal casting. This new composite structure shows much more plasticity when compared to the BMG without the steel wire. This improved plasticity will create a renewed interest into applications of BMGCs.
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