Applications of the embedded-atom method to glass formation and crystallization of liquid and glass transition-metal nickel

Abstract

Abstract The embedded-atom method (EAM) has been applied to investigate the effect of different cooling rates on the glass formation and crystallization processes in supercooled metallic liquid nickel. The crystallization of metallic glass as a function of increasing temperatures was also studied, using the constant-pressure molecular-dynamics simulation. The results indicate that the agreements between the calculated and experimental pair distribution functions and atomic volumes for the liquid nickel are quite good. The microstructure is greatly affected by the quenching rate. The non-equilibrium phase obtained in a supercooled liquid through a fast quenching process is a metallic glass, and the equilibrium phase resulting from slow cooling rate is a fcc-type crystal phase. Metallic glass is unstable during quenching and, with an increase in temperature, crystallization of the metallic glass occurs. The crystal structure resulting from the crystallization process is a fcc-type structure. The calculated ...