Metallic glasses (MGs) are a class of amorphous metal materials with remarkable properties. By leveraging an abundance of uncoordinated active sites that can serve as catalytic regions, MGs can have high catalytic activity and long-term stability as compared to their crystalline counterparts. Conventional synthesis methods cannot produce nanosized MGs with precise control over composition, phase, and morphology. This work presents flash Joule heating (FJH) as a novel one-step approach to synthesize fully amorphous MG nanoparticles while enabling unprecedented control over these critical parameters. The rapid heating (up to 2505 K/s) and ultrafast cooling rates (up to 1485 K/s) in FJH surpass the critical rates required for glass formation in metal-phosphide alloys like Pd-P, Pd-Ni-P, and Pd-Cu-P, preventing crystallization. Characterization techniques such as SAED, XRD, and XPS have confirmed the amorphous nature and metallic states of the nanoparticles.Remarkably, FJH allowed precise tuning of ternary alloy compositions spanning wide ranges from Pd-rich to Ni/Cu-rich regimes, closely matching designed precursor ratios. The technique significantly expanded the glass formation region compared to conventional methods, accessing previously unattainable compositions like binary Pd3P. Moreover, FJH enabled control over particle size from 2.33±0.83 nm to 36.5±10.1 nm with narrow distributions by optimizing precursors, thermal profiles, and alloy chemistries. Incorporation of multiple elements facilitated smaller nanoparticle formation due to enhanced entropy, reduced melting points, and decreased surface tension.The amorphous MG nanoparticles exhibited outstanding electrocatalytic performance and remarkable stability superiorities over their crystalline counterparts. For the oxygen evolution reaction, Pd-Ni-P MGs displayed ultra-low onset potentials ~300 mV below pure Pd and retained stable activity over 60 hours, contrasting rapid deactivation of crystalline samples of the same composition within 1 hour. PdCoP MGs for methanol oxidation showed high reaction rates and resilience against activity decline during accelerated durability testing, unlike rapidly decaying crystalline variants. This FJH synthesis approach unlocks new opportunities to realize the full potential of MGs by expanding the compositional space of alloy systems with precise control over MG properties, unlocking potential future transformative catalysts.Figure 1: Schematics for (a) a traditional heating-cooling process and (b) the FJH process. (c) Illustration of temperature vs. time diagram of supercooled liquid alloys and glass transformation.(d) Ternary phase diagrams of the Pd-Ni-P and Pd-Cu-P systems. Figure 1
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