Physics

Nanotechnology

Organic chemistry

Stacking-fault energy

Stacking fault

Partial dislocations

Crystal twinning

Crystallography

Ultimate tensile strength

Optics

Transmission electron microscopy

Dislocation

Composite material

Diffraction

Acoustics

Chemistry

Materials science

Slip (aerodynamics)

Deformation (meteorology)

Condensed matter physics

Lattice (music)

Alloy

Stacking

Quasistatic process

Microstructure

Thermodynamics

Nature Communications

Chemical short-range order in disordered solid solutions often emerges with specific heat treatments. Unlike thermally activated ordering, mechanically derived short-range order (MSRO) in a multi-principal-element Fe40Mn40Cr10Co10 (at%) alloy originates from tensile deformation at 77 K, and its degree/extent can be tailored by adjusting the loading rates under quasistatic conditions. The mechanical response and multi-length-scale characterisation pointed to the minor contribution of MSRO formation to yield strength, mechanical twinning, and deformation-induced displacive transformation. Scanning and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy and the anlaysis of electron diffraction patterns revealed the microstructural features responsible for MSRO and the dependence of the ordering degree/extent on the applied strain rates. Here, we show that underpinned by molecular dynamics, MSRO in the alloys with low stacking-fault energies forms when loaded at 77 K, and these systems that offer different perspectives on the process of strain-induced ordering transition are driven by crystalline lattice defects (dislocations and stacking faults).

Mechanically derived short-range order and its impact on the multi-principal-element alloys