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Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials

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A special issue of Materials (ISSN 1996-1944). This special issue belongs to the section "Advanced Materials Characterization".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2021) | Viewed by 30930

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Prof. Aleksei Viktorovich Panin

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Guest Editor

Institute of Strength Physics and Materials Science, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Tomsk, Russia
Interests: additive manufacturing,surface nanostructuring, coatings, deformation

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The high characteristics of strength, wear resistance, fatigue strength, and corrosion resistance of nanostructured materials (thin films and coatings, nanocrystalline materials, etc.) determine their crucial importance in the development of advanced materials. However, a correct discription of the mechanisms of deformation and fracture of nanostructured materials is no easy task. It is possible only if any solid under loading is considered as a multilevel self-organizing system where the plastic flow develops at different scale levels in a self-consistent way. Moreover, since the basic distinctive features of nano- and thin film materials are non-equilibrium steady state and extended internal and external interfaces, deep understanding of the mechanisms of residial stress generation as well as the mechanisms of stress distribution at all interfaces is necessary. Finally, it is extremely dificult to correctly describe the stress–relaxation behaviour of a solid under thermal or mechanical loading without the need to consider the evolution of their structure and phase composition which, in turn, control its deformation and fracture. That is why the main research still tends to consider their results in terms of a single-level approach.

This Special Issue will provide insights into the multi-scale approach to understanding the mechanisms of deformation and fracture of nano and thin film materials.

Prof. Aleksei Viktorovich Panin
Guest Editor

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Keywords

coatings
fracture mechanisms
delamination
cracking
microsrtucture

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Published Papers (6 papers)

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Research

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13 pages, 5062 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Effects of Geometric and Crystallographic Factors on the Reliability of Al/Si Vertically Cracked Nanofilm/Substrate Systems

by Jee S. Shim, Dong H. Go and Hyeon G. Beom

Materials 2021, 14(13), 3570; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma14133570 - 25 Jun 2021

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2160

Abstract

In this study, tensile tests on aluminum/silicon vertically cracked nanofilm/substrate systems were performed using atomistic simulations. Various crystallographic orientations and thicknesses of the aluminum nanofilms were considered to analyze the effects of these factors on the reliability of the nanofilm/substrate systems. The results show that systems with some specific crystallographic orientations have lower reliability compared to the other orientations because of the penetration of the vertical crack into the silicon substrate. This penetration phenomenon occurring in a specific model is related to a high coincidence of atomic matching between the interfaces in the model. This high coincidence leads to a tendency of the interface to maintain a coherent form in which the outermost silicon atoms of the substrate that are bonded to the aluminum nanofilm tend to stick with the aluminum atoms under tensile loads. This phenomenon was verified by interface energy calculations in the simulation models. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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12 pages, 3084 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Improvement of Thermal Cycling Resistance of Al_xSi_1−xN Coatings on Cu Substrates by Optimizing Al/Si Ratio

by Alexey Panin, Artur Shugurov, Marina Kazachenok and Victor Sergeev

Materials 2019, 12(14), 2249; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12142249 - 12 Jul 2019

Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2776

Abstract

The effect of the elemental composition of Al_xSi_1−xN coatings deposited on Cu substrates by magnetron sputtering on their structure, mechanical properties and thermal cycling performance is studied. The coatings with Al-Si-N solid solution, two-phase (Al_xSi_1−xN nanocrystallites embedded in the Si_xN_y tissue phase) and amorphous structure were obtained by varying Al/Si ratio. It is shown that polycrystalline coatings with a low Si content (Al_0.88Si_0.12N) are characterized by the highest thermal cycling resistance. While the coatings with a high and intermediate Si content (Al_0.11Si_0.89N and Al_0.74Si_0.26N) were subjected to cracking and spallation after the first cycle of annealing at a temperature of 1000 °C, delamination of the Al_0.88Si_0.12N coating was observed after 25 annealing cycles. The Al_0.88Si_0.12N coating also exhibited the best barrier performance against copper diffusion from the substrate. The effect of thermal stresses on the diffusion barrier performance of the coatings against copper diffusion is discussed. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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12 pages, 2933 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Nanomechanical and Material Properties of Fluorine-Doped Tin Oxide Thin Films Prepared by Ultrasonic Spray Pyrolysis: Effects of F-Doping

by Le Thi Cam Tuyen, Sheng-Rui Jian, Nguyen Thanh Tien and Phuoc Huu Le

Materials 2019, 12(10), 1665; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12101665 - 22 May 2019

Cited by 45 | Viewed by 5622

Abstract

Fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) thin films were deposited on glass substrates using ultrasonic spray pyrolysis (USP) at a fixed substrate temperature of 400 °C and various Fluorine/Tin (F/Sn) atomic ratios of 0, 0.1, 0.5, and 1.0. Effects of F/Sn atomic ratios on structural-morphological, compositional, electrical, optical, and nanomechanical properties of the FTO thin films were systematically studied. The FTO films exhibited a tetragonal structure with preferred orientations of (110), (200), and (211), and polycrystalline morphology with spear-like or coconut shell-like particles on the surfaces. The presence of F-doping was confirmed by XPS results with clear F1s peaks, and F-concentration was determined to be 0.7% for F/Sn = 0.1 and 5.1% for F/Sn = 0.5. Moreover, the resistivity of FTO films reduced remarkably from 4.1 mΩcm at F/Sn = 0 to 0.7 mΩcm at F/Sn = 1, primarily due to the corresponding increase of carrier concentration from 2 × 10²⁰ cm⁻³ to 1.2 × 10²¹ cm⁻³. The average optical transmittance of the films prepared at F/Sn of 0–0.5 was over 90%, and it decreased to 84.4% for the film prepared at F/Sn = 1. The hardness (H) and Young’s modulus (E) of the FTO films increased when the F/Sn ratios increased from 0 to 0.5, reaching maximum values of H = 12.3 ± 0.4 GPa, E = 131.7 ± 8.0 GPa at F/Sn = 0.5. Meanwhile, the H and E reduced considerably when the F/Sn ratio further increased to 1.0, following the inverse Hall-Petch effect approximately, suggesting that the grain boundary effect played a primary role in manipulating the nanomechanical properties of the FTO films. Furthermore, favorable mechanical properties with large H/E_f and

H^{3} / E_{f}^{2}

ratios were found for the FTO film prepared at F/Sn = 0.5, which possessed high crystallinity, large grain size, and compact morphology. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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15 pages, 2996 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Investigation of Grain Refinement Mechanism of Nickel Single Crystal during High Pressure Torsion by Crystal Plasticity Modeling

by Peitang Wei, Hao Zhou, Huaiju Liu, Caichao Zhu, Wei Wang and Guanyu Deng

Materials 2019, 12(3), 351; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12030351 - 23 Jan 2019

Cited by 12 | Viewed by 3271

Abstract

The excellent properties of ultra-fine grained (UFG) materials are relevant to substantial grain refinement and the corresponding induced small grains delineated by high-angle grain boundaries. The present study aims to understand the grain refinement mechanism by examining the nickel single crystal processed by high pressure torsion (HPT), a severe plastic deformation method to produce UFG materials based upon crystal plasticity finite element (CPFEM) simulations. The predicted grain maps by the developed CPFEM model are capable of capturing the prominent characteristics associated with grain refinement in HPT. The evolution of the orientation of structural elements and the rotations of crystal lattices during the HPT process of the detected differently oriented grains are extensively examined. It has been found that there are mainly two intrinsic origins of lattice rotation which cause the initial single crystal to subdivide. The correlation between the crystallographic orientation changes and lattice rotations with the grain fragmentation are analyzed and discussed in detail based on the theory of crystal plasticity. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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10 pages, 4042 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Coupled EBSD/TEM Analysis of the Microstructure Evolution of a Gradient Nanostructured Ferritic/Martensitic Steel Subjected to Surface Mechanical Attrition Treatment

by Wenbo Liu, Xiao Jin, Bo Zhang, Di Yun and Piheng Chen

Materials 2019, 12(1), 140; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12010140 - 3 Jan 2019

Cited by 12 | Viewed by 3908

Abstract

Surface mechanical attrition treatment (SMAT) was performed on a reduced ferritic/martensitic (RAFM) steel to form a nanostructured (NS) layer on the surface of the sample. Both electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and TEM were used to investigate the microstructure evolution during SMAT. The experimental results showed that there were three different zones after SMAT: (i) The “ultrafine grain” (UFG) zone, observed at the top-most surface region, (ii) the “transition zone” in which the original grains were fragmented under the severe plastic deformation and (iii) the “deformed zone” in which the original grains were simply deformed. The average grain sizes increased rapidly with the increase of depth, while the Vickers hardness decreased with the increase of depth, and this phenomenon could be explained in terms of boundary strengthening and dislocation strengthening. The number fractions of medium-angle grain boundaries (MAGBs) and medium-high-angle grain boundaries (MHAGBs) in UFG zones were larger than those in the transition zone and the deformed zone. However, the number fraction of the low-angle grain boundaries (LAGBs) was extremely small in all the zones after SMAT, especially in the transition zone. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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Review

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18 pages, 6093 KiB

Open AccessReview

Deformation of Single Crystals, Polycrystalline Materials, and Thin Films: A Review

by Guijun Yang and Soo-Jin Park

Materials 2019, 12(12), 2003; https://doi.org/10.3390/ma12122003 - 22 Jun 2019

Cited by 83 | Viewed by 12355

Abstract

With the rapid development of nano-preparation processes, nanocrystalline materials have been widely developed in the fields of mechanics, electricity, optics, and thermal physics. Compared to the case of coarse-grained or amorphous materials, plastic deformation in nanomaterials is limited by the reduction in feature size, so that they generally have high strength, but the toughness is relatively high. The “reciprocal relationship” between the strength and toughness of nanomaterials limits the large-scale application and development of nanomaterials. Therefore, the maintenance of high toughness while improving the strength of nanomaterials is an urgent problem to be solved. So far, although the relevant mechanism affecting the deformation of nanocrystalline materials has made a big breakthrough, it is still not very clear. Therefore, this paper introduces the basic deformation type, mechanism, and model of single crystals, polycrystalline materials, and thin films, and aims to provide literature support for future research. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Deformation and Fracture of Thin Films and Nanostructured Materials)

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