Sun Yang, Zhang Feng, Ye Zhuo, Zhang Yue, Fang Xiaowei, Ding Zejun, Wang Cai-Zhuang, Mendelev Mikhail I, Ott Ryan T, Kramer Matthew J, Ho Kai-Ming
Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and Department of Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China.
Ames Laboratory, US Department of Energy, Ames, Iowa 50011, USA.
Sci Rep. 2016 Mar 31;6:23734. doi: 10.1038/srep23734.
We analyze the underlying structural order that transcends liquid, glass and crystalline states in metallic systems. A genetic algorithm is applied to search for the most common energetically favorable packing motifs in crystalline structures. These motifs are in turn compared to the observed packing motifs in the actual liquid or glass structures using a cluster-alignment method. Using this method, we have revealed the nature of the short-range order in Cu64Zr36 glasses. More importantly, we identified a novel structural order in the Al90Sm10 system. In addition, our approach brings new insight into understanding the origin of vitrification and describing mesoscopic order-disorder transitions in condensed matter systems.
我们分析了金属系统中超越液态、玻璃态和晶态的潜在结构秩序。应用遗传算法来寻找晶体结构中能量上最有利的常见堆积模式。然后使用聚类排列方法将这些模式与实际液态或玻璃态结构中观察到的堆积模式进行比较。通过这种方法，我们揭示了Cu64Zr36玻璃中短程有序的本质。更重要的是，我们在Al90Sm10系统中发现了一种新的结构秩序。此外，我们的方法为理解玻璃化的起源以及描述凝聚态系统中的介观有序-无序转变带来了新的见解。
