Structure Heterogeneity in Metallic Glass: Modeling and Experiment

Despite the great efforts dedicated to metallic glasses (MGs), their structure still remains a mystery to be understood. With comparison to the existing micromechanical models, such as the free-volume and shear transformation zone (STZ) models, we first discuss in this article our recently proposed 'core-shell' model, which contains a solid-like matrix and liquid-like inclusions. This serves as the theoretical basis to understand the structural heterogeneity in MGs in our analytical framework. After that, a scanning ultrafast nanoindentation technique is used to map out the structure heterogeneity in a Zr-based bulk metallic glass (BMG). With these ongoing research efforts, we hope that more research work could be stimulated in the pursuit of the structure-property relation in MGs.