The properties of nanocrystalline materials are essentially determined by the grain size and the properties of the grain boundaries of the respective material. Using PAC for the investigation of nanocrystalline materials new information about structural properties and, in case of nanocrystalline semiconductors, electronic properties are obtained. In combination with “classical” experimental tec...

In recent years, near-nano (submicron) and nanostructured materials have attracted increasingly more attention from the materials community. Nanocrystalline materials are characterized by a microstructural length or grain size of up to about 100 nm. Materials having grain size of 0.1 to 0.3 mm are classified as submicron materials. Nanocrystalline materials exhibit various shapes or forms, and ...

mechanical alloying of binary and ternary elemental powder mixtures with the nominal compositions of mg2ni and mg(2-x)mnxni (x= 0, 0.05, 0.10 and 0.15 at. %) were carried out in a planetary ball mill for various milling times of 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 and 60 h. x-ray diffraction and field emission scanning and transmission electron microscopy were used for the characterization of the milled products...

Thin film Ni-Cu diffusion couples (individual layer thicknesses: 50 nm) were prepared by direct-current magnetron sputtering on silicon substrates. Interdiffusion and solid-solution formation, the associated changes of microstructure and the evolution of mechanical stresses of the Ni-Cu diffusion couples during thermal treatments were investigated employing ex-situ X-ray diffraction phase and t...

We report transmission electron microscope observations that provide evidence of deformation twinning in plastically deformed nanocrystalline aluminum. The presence of these twins is directly related to the nanocrystalline structure, because they are not observed in coarse-grained pure aluminum. We propose a dislocation-based model to explain the preference for deformation twins and stacking fa...

In this work, thermal transport in nanocrystalline materials is studied using large-scale equilibrium molecular dynamics simulation. Nanocrystalline materials with different grain sizes are studied to explore how and to what extent the size of nanograins affects the thermal conductivity and specific heat. Substantial thermal conductivity reduction is observed and the reduction is stronger for n...

Nanocrystalline materials, with a grain size of typically < 100 nm, are a new class of materials with properties vastly different from and often superior to those of the conventional coarse-grained materials. These materials can be synthesized by a number of different techniques and the grain size, morphology, and composition can be controlled by controlling the process parameters. In compariso...

Nanocrystalline (nc) materials can be defined as solids with grain sizes in the range of 1–100 nm. Contrary to coarse-grained metals, which become more difficult to twin with decreasing grain size, nanocrystalline face-centered-cubic (fcc) metals become easier to twin with decreasing grain size, reaching a maximum twinning probability, and then become more difficult to twin when the grain size ...

Large increases in the upper critical field B(C2)(0) are reported in bulk superconductors that demonstrate another novel property for nanocrystalline materials. Disordered nanocrystalline PbMo6S8 superconductors were fabricated by mechanical milling and hot isostatic pressing. Conventional PbMo6S8 has B(C2)(0) approximately 50 T. The nanocrystalline materials have higher resistivity (rho(N)) an...

The accumulation of defects, and in particular He bubbles, can have significant implications for the performance of materials exposed to the plasma in magnetic-confinement nuclear fusion reactors. Some of the most promising candidates for deployment into such environments are nanocrystalline materials as the engineering of grain boundary density offers the possibility of tailoring their radiati...