Advances in Metallic Glass Nanocomposites

A special issue of Nanomaterials (ISSN 2079-4991). This special issue belongs to the section "Nanocomposite Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 October 2026 | Viewed by 870

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Collaborative Innovation Center of Steel Technology, University of Science and Technology Beijing, Beijing 100083, China
Interests: mechanical constitutive relationships and strengthening mechanisms of metallic glasses and their composites; solid mechanics and micromechanics of metals; finite element theory and its applications

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Guest Editor
School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, China
Interests: metastable alloys (nano-amorphous, amorphous alloys, high-entropy alloys, etc.) catalysis

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Metallic glasses (MGs), which are characterized by a lack of long-range order and possess unique properties such as high specific strength, good corrosion resistance, and soft magnetic and unique net-shape formability, have attracted tremendous research interest since their discovery in the 1960s.

In recent years, enormous efforts have been devoted to improving the plasticity of MGs. The most intuitive route is to prevent the propagation of primary shear bands through MGs. The concept of heterogeneous structure is widely accepted to be useful in improving the plasticity of MGs by blocking the localized shear bands.

Another prominent area of research focuses on enhancing the soft magnetic property of MG. The conventional design of soft-magnetic MGs heavily relies on “trial and error” experiments. It is difficult to balance the saturation flux density and thermal stability due to the strong interplay between glass formation and magnetic interaction. Recently developed machine learning techniques have emerged as powerful tools in this field, particularly for predicting glass formation behaviors. By utilizing advanced machine learning models, researchers can facilitate efficient alloy design for advanced magnetic metallic glasses with desirable properties.

Lastly, we must pay closer attention to the catalytic performance of metallic glasses stemming from their disordered structures and high Gibbs free energy states. It is well established that catalytic performance is closely related to the density of active sites. However, modifying the catalytic properties of MGs through control over their disordered atomic structures remains a significant challenge.

Here, we should focus on how the heterogeneous or inhomogeneous structure affect the plasticity, soft magnetic, and catalytic performance and demonstrate the brilliant recent research in this Special Issue.

Dr. Yongwei Wang
Dr. Shuangqin Chen
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • metallic glass
  • plasticity
  • soft magnetic
  • catalytic performance
  • inhomogeneous structure

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

18 pages, 7646 KB  
Article
The Transition from Strain Softening to Strain Hardening in Metallic Glasses
by Yongwei Wang, Guangping Zheng and Mo Li
Nanomaterials 2026, 16(5), 319; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano16050319 - 3 Mar 2026
Viewed by 463
Abstract
Despite their excellent mechanical properties, metallic glasses (MGs) are significantly hindered by poor plasticity and toughness, which are essential for structural applications. The brittleness arises from the rapid propagation of shear bands (SBs), leading to strain softening and catastrophic failure. Recent advancements in [...] Read more.
Despite their excellent mechanical properties, metallic glasses (MGs) are significantly hindered by poor plasticity and toughness, which are essential for structural applications. The brittleness arises from the rapid propagation of shear bands (SBs), leading to strain softening and catastrophic failure. Recent advancements in microstructural engineering, particularly boundary engineering, such as nano-glass, focus on the utilization of heterogeneous structures to promote the proliferation and delocalization of SBs. Various attempts have been made experimentally to address these issues, but with very limited improvement in tensile strength and toughness. Under tensile loading, micro- or nano-pillar samples exhibit strain softening and continue to undergo plastic deformation after reaching yield or peak stress, especially the nano-glass micro-pillar. Reports on tensile strain-hardening in MG micro-pillars are rare. In this finite element simulation study, we optimize appropriate statistical and spatial distributions of free volume within the microsamples. Both the post-yield strength and the mean tangent modulus increase with progressive gradient structural modifications, thereby inducing a transition from strain-softening to strain-hardening behavior, as well as a concurrent transition from plastic fracture to brittle fracture. We systematically investigate the deformation mechanisms and transition mechanisms of fracture modes, which are closely associated with heterogeneous microstructures and their evolution in MGs. These insights into the transition mechanism could significantly facilitate the design and optimization of MGs to achieve enhanced toughness and strain hardening. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Metallic Glass Nanocomposites)
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