Exceptionally strong and ductile bulk metallic glass composite with bioinspired architecture mimicking porcupine fish spine

Abstract

Introducing soft crystalline phases into the glassy matrix to produce bulk metallic glass composites (BMGCs) is an effective way to enhance the ductility of bulk metallic glasses (BMGs). However, the introduction of soft crystalline phases severely sacrifices the strength, resulting in the strength-ductility trade-off. To defeat this dilemma, here, we successfully fabricate a bioinspired BMGC with architecture mimicking a porcupine fish spine. The bioinspired BMGC shows a pronounced yield strength of ∼800 MPa with an excellent fracture strain of ∼35 %. The fabrication of the bioinspired BMGC is achieved through infiltration and vitrification of molten Zr50Ti5Cu27Ni10Al8(Zr50) melt into the crystalline Nb skeleton fabricated by laser additive manufacturing (LAM). Such enhanced strength-ductility synergy is attributed to the asynchronous deformation associated with the delicate bioinspired heterogeneous architecture. The bioinspired structural design motif, enabled by the combination of LAM and infiltration casting technologies, opens a new window to develop high-performance BMGCs on a large scale for structural applications.