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Metals
Special Issues
Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials
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Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials

A special issue of Metals (ISSN 2075-4701).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 August 2026 | Viewed by 8185

Editors

Dr. Francesca Borgioli

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Industrial Engineering (DIEF), Università degli Studi di Firenze, Via Santa Marta 3, 50139 Firenze, Italy
Interests: surface engineering; plasma nitriding; plasma carburizing; expanded austenite; expanded ferrite; expanded martensite
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Shinichiro Adachi

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Osaka Research Institute of Industrial Science and Technology, Osaka 594-1157, Japan
Interests: plasma nitriding; plasma carburizing; thermal spraying; laser metal deposition
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Thomas Lindner

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Materials and Surface Engineering Group, Institute of Materials Science and Engineering, Chemnitz University of Technology, 09107 Chemnitz, Germany
Interests: thermal spraying; thermochemical treatment; heat treatment; spark plasma sintering; laser cladding; high-entropy alloys; stainless steel
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nowadays surface engineering of metallic materials has become an important tool for improving the performance, extending the life, and also enhancing the appearance of components used in many fields. Modifying the surface and the near-surface regions of the materials allows for increasing corrosion resistance, tribological properties, and fatigue resistance; changing wetting behavior; enhancing biocompatibility; and modulating the electric and magnetic properties. Surface modification techniques range from finishing processes, such as electrolytic polishing (EP), electrolytic plasma polishing (EPP), and micro- or nano-texturing, to coating processes, such as the plating and electroplating processes, electrolytic oxidation, chemical vapor deposition (CVD), physical vapor deposition (PVD), thermal spraying, and direct energy deposition (DED), up to diffusion processes, such as nitriding, carburizing, nitrocarburizing, and boriding, which can be improved using plasma or ion implantation techniques. Further enhancement of the surface properties can be obtained by combining different treatments, as in the duplex treatments.

This Special Issue aims to stimulate researchers worldwide to share their studies on surface engineering of metallic materials, from the used treatment processes to the characteristics and properties of the obtained modified surfaces. For this purpose, original research articles, review articles, and significant preliminary communications are invited related to both experimental and theoretical studies.

Dr. Francesca Borgioli
Dr. Shinichiro Adachi
Dr. Thomas Lindner
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Metals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • surface engineering
  • advanced polishing
  • texturing
  • PVD
  • CVD
  • thermal spraying
  • direct energy deposition
  • nitriding
  • carburizing
  • boronizing

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Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

Jump to: Review

17 pages, 4028 KB  
Article
Mechanical Properties of High-Entropy Coatings of the (TiZrVCrAl)N System of Different Architectures Deposited by the Arc-PVD Method on the Surface of Ti-6Al-4V Alloy
by Yana N. Savina, Roman R. Valiev, Stanislav V. Ovchinnikov, Almaz Yu. Nazarov, Iuliia M. Modina, Aleksey A. Nikolaev, Kamil’ N. Ramazanov, Vitaly V. Sanin, Liliya Yu. Mezhevaia, Elina R. Kasimova, Arnaud Caron and Ruslan Z. Valiev
Metals 2026, 16(3), 350; https://doi.org/10.3390/met16030350 - 20 Mar 2026
Viewed by 632
Abstract
In this work, for the first time, we applied and determined the mechanical characteristics of protective coatings made of high-entropy alloy (TiZrVCrAl)N with different architectures onto the surface of Ti-6Al-4V alloy with the initial coarse-grained and ultrafine-grained structure using arc physical vapor deposition. [...] Read more.
In this work, for the first time, we applied and determined the mechanical characteristics of protective coatings made of high-entropy alloy (TiZrVCrAl)N with different architectures onto the surface of Ti-6Al-4V alloy with the initial coarse-grained and ultrafine-grained structure using arc physical vapor deposition. We designed and prepared three coating architectures: a monolayer nitride coating (TiZrVCrAl)N, a multilayer coating consisting of nine alternating layers of TiZrVCrAl and (TiZrVCrAl)N, and a multilayer coating consisting of 720 alternating layers of (TiZrVCrAl)N and TiN, with a total thickness not exceeding 2 microns. We evaluated their protective performances by nanoindentation and scratch tests. Importantly, the effect of the substrate microstructure on the coatings’ performance is investigated by comparing their mechanical behavior on coarse-grained and ultrafine-grained Ti-6Al-4V. Our experimental results show that the coating performance improves with increasing number of layers in the coating, and this effect is even more pronounced for the multilayer coating deposited on the ultrafine-grained titanium alloy substrate. We also find that the (TiZrVCrAl)N/TiN (720 layers) multilayer coating deposited on the UFG Ti-6Al-4V alloy substrate exhibits the highest H/E- and H3/E2-values, indicating the coating’s high innovative potential for performance in extreme conditions. The origins of this phenomenon are analyzed and discussed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials)
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17 pages, 5540 KB  
Article
Investigation of the Mechanical Properties and Friction Coefficient of Cr/CrTiAl and Cr/(CrTiAl)N/CrTiAl PVD Coatings Deposited on 42CrMo4 QT Steel
by Yavor Sofronov, Boyan Dochev, Valentin Mishev, Antonio Nikolov, Krum Petrov, Rayna Dimitrova, Milko Yordanov, Milko Angelov, Georgi Todorov and Krassimir Marchev
Metals 2026, 16(2), 231; https://doi.org/10.3390/met16020231 - 17 Feb 2026
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 911
Abstract
Test specimens fabricated from 42CrMo4 steel were subjected to heat treatment comprising quenching followed by high-temperature tempering. This treatment is commonly referred to as hardening, and the result is a tempered sorbite microstructure that provides a balanced combination of strength and plasticity. In [...] Read more.
Test specimens fabricated from 42CrMo4 steel were subjected to heat treatment comprising quenching followed by high-temperature tempering. This treatment is commonly referred to as hardening, and the result is a tempered sorbite microstructure that provides a balanced combination of strength and plasticity. In order to improve the hardness and wear resistance of the contact surfaces, two types of physical vapor deposition (PVD) coatings were deposited onto the specimens: the first was a two-component architecture Cr/CrTiAl and the second was a multilayer Cr/(CrTiAl)N/CrTiAl. In both configurations, an intermediate chromium adhesion layer was initially deposited to enhance interfacial bonding with the substrate. The adhesion strength of the deposited coatings to the steel substrates was evaluated using a standardized adhesion test. The adhesion quality was classified as HF1 (the highest adhesion class in the HF1–HF6 scale, defined in EN ISO 26443), indicating excellent interfacial bonding. The hardness and modulus of elasticity of both coatings were determined through nanoindentation. According to the measured hardness values of the two coatings, 27.3 GPa (Cr/CrTiAl) and 37.5 GPa (Cr/(CrTiAl)N/CrTiAl), they can be classified as hard coatings (hardness greater than 20 GPa). Despite the difference in hardness, the two coatings have comparable elastic modulus values: Eit = 353 GPa for the two-component architecture coating and Eit = 349 GPa for the three-component architecture coating. Tribological characterization was performed using the ball-on-disc method under dry sliding conditions over a total sliding distance of 59 m, whereby the friction coefficient (µ) was recorded. Additionally, the wear rate of the applied coatings was calculated from the measured wear volumes or profiles. The two coatings have comparable friction coefficient values (Cr/CrTiAl–μ = 0.362, Cr/(CrTiAl)N/CrTiAl–μ = 0.325), but the three-component architecture coating Cr/(CrTiAl)N/CrTiAl has a lower wear rate (k = 1.64 × 10−4) compared to the two-component architecture coating Cr/CrTiAl, which has a wear rate of k = 7.6 × 10−4. The investigated coatings have hardness, modulus of elasticity and friction coefficient values competitive with those of nitride coatings (two-component architecture and three-component architecture), and their wear rate also corresponds to generally accepted values. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials)
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17 pages, 23665 KB  
Article
Corrosion Properties and Performance of Nanostructured Multilayered Chromium–Amorphous Carbon Coatings on HS6-5-2 Steel
by Boriana Tzaneva, Yavor Sofronov, Krum Petrov, Valentin Mishev, Rayna Dimitrova, Antonio Nikolov, Milko Yordanov, Milko Angelov, Boyan Dochev and Krassimir Marchev
Metals 2026, 16(2), 149; https://doi.org/10.3390/met16020149 - 26 Jan 2026
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 628
Abstract
Magnetron-sputtered coatings consisting of multiple alternating layers of chromium and amorphous carbon (Cr/a-C)ml were deposited on HS6-5-2 steel with an intermediate chromium layer by varying deposition rates. Three series of coatings, S1, S2, and S3, with thicknesses of 1.74, 1.15, and 1.14 μm [...] Read more.
Magnetron-sputtered coatings consisting of multiple alternating layers of chromium and amorphous carbon (Cr/a-C)ml were deposited on HS6-5-2 steel with an intermediate chromium layer by varying deposition rates. Three series of coatings, S1, S2, and S3, with thicknesses of 1.74, 1.15, and 1.14 μm and average chromium contents of 89.3, 66.0, and 59.7 wt.% Cr, respectively, were obtained. Open-circuit potential, cyclic potentiodynamic measurements, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy were used to characterize their corrosion resistance in 3.5% NaCl. The surfaces were observed with optical and scanning electron microscopy before and after the corrosion tests, and changes in the elemental composition were monitored by energy-dispersive spectroscopy. The protective properties of coatings from series S2 and S3 are similar and significantly better than those of S1. They are characterized by a corrosion current below 1 μA cm–2 and a stable passive state up to over 0.9 VAg/AgCl. The coatings have cathodic behavior towards the substrate, and when the coatings are damaged, galvanic corrosion causes deep pits. Coatings deposited at lower rates and with higher carbon content demonstrate significantly enhanced corrosion resistance in 3.5% NaCl. All three series of Cr/(Cr/a-C)ml@HS6-5-2 exhibit identical corrosion behavior after compromising the coatings’ integrity. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials)
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20 pages, 13705 KB  
Article
Harnessing Hydrothermal Treatments to Control Magnesium Alloy Degradation for Bioresorbable Implants: A Comprehensive Evaluation of Bath Chemistry Effect
by Matteo Pavarini, Nadia Milanesi, Monica Moscatelli and Roberto Chiesa
Metals 2025, 15(9), 1056; https://doi.org/10.3390/met15091056 - 22 Sep 2025
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 974
Abstract
Magnesium alloys have been recently recognized as promising materials for temporary orthopedic applications, thanks to their biocompatibility, nontoxicity and biodegradability, combined with bone-like mechanical properties; nevertheless, their clinical viability is still hindered by their excessively rapid corrosion in physiological environments. In this context, [...] Read more.
Magnesium alloys have been recently recognized as promising materials for temporary orthopedic applications, thanks to their biocompatibility, nontoxicity and biodegradability, combined with bone-like mechanical properties; nevertheless, their clinical viability is still hindered by their excessively rapid corrosion in physiological environments. In this context, hydrothermal surface modification offers a simple and inexpensive option to form thick ceramic conversion films capable of protecting magnesium and delaying the initial stages of corrosion. In this study, magnesium samples were hydrothermally treated in various aqueous baths to systematically assess the influence of their chemistry on the resulting coating features. The obtained coatings were characterized in terms of physicochemical properties, electrochemical corrosion behavior in SBF, and long-term degradation with volumetric loss quantification by µ-CT. The results highlighted how corrosion resistance is dictated by coating uniformity rather than thickness. Moreover, XRD analyses revealed that all the best-performing coatings contained a stable magnesium oxide phase in addition to magnesium hydroxide, a feature absent in less protective films. A simple sodium nitrate solution was found to produce the most protective layer, showing the lowest volumetric losses after immersion testing. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials)
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Review

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38 pages, 4337 KB  
Review
A Review of Wear-Resistant Coatings for Steel Substrates: Applications and Challenges
by Yanhong Wang, Chao Feng, Tao Lin, Rong Zhu, Jie Zhang, Huapeng Yang, Shanghai Yi, Junlin He, Mingwei Tu and Guangsheng Wei
Metals 2025, 15(11), 1231; https://doi.org/10.3390/met15111231 - 7 Nov 2025
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 4237
Abstract
This study reviews the current research status and future trends in the field of abrasive-resistant coating preparation, focusing on steel coating technology. The types of materials, preparation methods, and application status of the abrasive-resistant coatings are described in detail. First, the necessity for [...] Read more.
This study reviews the current research status and future trends in the field of abrasive-resistant coating preparation, focusing on steel coating technology. The types of materials, preparation methods, and application status of the abrasive-resistant coatings are described in detail. First, the necessity for an abrasive-resistant coating is analyzed from the perspective of steel applications. Second, abrasive-resistant coating materials of different substrates, including metal-, ceramic-, composite-, and polymer-based materials, are systematically expounded, and the composition, property characteristics, and applications of the materials are systematically discussed. Next, the principles, advantages, and disadvantages of different preparation techniques are analyzed and compared, and the relevant research results are summarized, showing the urgent demand and application prospects of abrasive-resistant coatings. Finally, the performance of the coating is presented, and the development trend of abrasive-resistant coatings on steel surfaces is discussed, providing theoretical support and new ideas for innovation in this field. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Surface Modification of Metallic Materials)
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