Journal
NATURE MATERIALS
Volume 20, Issue 10, Pages 1347-+Publisher
NATURE PORTFOLIO
DOI: 10.1038/s41563-021-01011-5
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Funding
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [51871120, 51571170, 51520105001]
- Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province [BK20200019]
- Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [30919011107, 30919011404]
- Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Joint Laboratory for Neutron Scattering Science and Technology [2019B121205003]
- Croucher Foundation [9500034]
- Research Grants Council of Hong Kong SAR [JLFS/P-102/18]
- DOE Office of Science [DE-AC02-06CH11357]
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Amorphous materials lack long-range order but exhibit ordered structures at short and medium range, with the nature of medium-range ordering often remaining elusive. A study of an intermediate crystalline cubic phase in a Pd-Ni-P amorphous alloy revealed a six-membered tricapped trigonal prism cluster (6M-TTP) as the medium-range ordered structure. The structural link between the amorphous and crystalline phases at the medium-range length scale was demonstrated, highlighting the role of 6M-TTP clusters in distinguishing crystalline and amorphous phases.
Amorphous materials have no long-range order, but there are ordered structures at short range (2-5 angstrom), medium range (5-20 angstrom) and even longer length scales(1-5). While regular(6,7) and semiregular polyhedra(8-10) are often found as short-range ordering in amorphous materials, the nature of medium-range order has remained elusive(11-14). Consequently, it is difficult to determine whether there exists any structural link at medium range or longer length scales between the amorphous material and its crystalline counterparts. Moreover, an amorphous material often crystallizes into a phase of different composition(15), with very different underlying structural building blocks, further compounding the issue. Here, we capture an intermediate crystalline cubic phase in a Pd-Ni-P amorphous alloy and reveal the structure of the medium-range order, a six-membered tricapped trigonal prism cluster (6M-TTP) with a length scale of 12.5 angstrom. We find that the 6M-TTP can pack periodically to several tens of nanometres to form the cube phase. Our experimental observations provide evidence of a structural link between the amorphous and crystalline phases in a Pd-Ni-P alloy at the medium-range length scale and suggest that it is the connectivity of the 6M-TTP clusters that distinguishes the crystalline and amorphous phases. These findings will shed light on the structure of amorphous materials at extended length scales beyond that of short-range order.
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