An experimental study is presented to measure the elastic, yielding, and crushing properties of individual particles under compression using substrates made aluminum alloy, stainless steel, sapphire. Carefully selected, highly spherical Ottawa sand 0.75–1.1 mm in nominal diameter were compressed between two smooth substrates, load–deformation curves analyzed by Hertz elastic contact theory deri...

Tin (Sn) is a key industrial material in coatings on various components in the electronics industry. However, Sn is prone to the development of filament-like whiskers, which is the leading cause of many types of damage to electronics reported in the last several decades. Due to its properties, a tin-lead (Sn-Pb) alloy coating can mitigate Sn whisker growth. However, the demand for Pb-free surfa...

Designed as a high-capacity alloy host for Na-ion chemistry, a forest of Sn nanorods with a unique core-shell structure was synthesized on viral scaffolds, which were genetically engineered to ensure a nearly vertical alignment upon self-assembly onto a metal substrate. The interdigital spaces thus formed between individual rods effectively accommodated the volume expansion and contraction of t...

Remarkable magnetic and spin-dependent transport properties arise from well-designed spintronic materials and heterostructures. Half-metallic Heusler alloys with high spin polarization exhibit properties that are particularly advantageous for the development of high-performance spintronic devices. Here, we report fully (001)-epitaxial growth of a high-quality half-metallic NiMnSb half-Heusler a...

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon-chalcogen alloy thin films have been the subject of growing interest during the past two decades. Thin films of these alloys are usually prepared by the decomposition of SiH4 and H2S or H2Se gas mixtures in a radiofrequency plasma glow discharge at a substrate temperature of 250°C. The alloy composition is varied by changing the gas volume ratio RV = [chalcogen/ s...

Liquid-phase bonding is a technologically important method to fabricate high-performance metal/ceramic heterostructures used for power electronic devices. However, the atomic-scale mechanisms of how these two dissimilar crystals specifically bond at the interfaces are still not well understood. Here we analyse the atomically-resolved structure of a liquid-phase bonded heterointerface between Al...