Metallic glasses (MGs) exhibit many unique properties because of their disordered microstructure. However, the absence of tensile plasticity at room temperature severely restricts the potential of MGs as high-performance structural materials. Here, Zr-based MG with a hierarchically heterogeneous structure in length was fabricated to enhance the tensile plasticity. Higher structural heterogeneity with a characteristic length of 12–20 nm was obtained by thermal cycling treatment. Subsequently, a micron array with a lower elastic modulus was prepared via high-frequency vibration. The hierarchical micro-nanostructured Zr-based MG exhibits a tensile plasticity of 0.68% at room temperature. Combined with finite element calculations and molecular dynamics simulations, the mechanism of the plastic deformation is attributed to more activated deformation units at the nanoscale and shear bands blocking and branching by complicated stress distributions at the micrometer scale. The findings presented herein can expand the understanding of structural heterogeneity, and provide a theoretical foundation for enhancing the tensile plasticity of MGs.

中文翻译：

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具有拉伸塑性的分层微纳米结构 Zr 基金属玻璃


金属玻璃 （MG） 由于其无序的微观结构而表现出许多独特的特性。然而，室温下缺乏拉伸塑性严重限制了 MGs 作为高性能结构材料的潜力。在这里，制造了具有长度分层异质结构的 Zr 基 MG 以增强拉伸塑性。通过热循环处理获得了更高的结构异质性，特征长度为 12-20 nm。随后，通过高频振动制备了具有较低弹性模量的微米阵列。分层微纳结构 Zr 基 MG 在室温下表现出 0.68% 的拉伸塑性。结合有限元计算和分子动力学模拟，塑性变形的机制归因于纳米尺度上更多的激活变形单元和微米尺度上复杂应力分布的剪切带阻塞和分支。本文提出的研究结果可以扩展对结构异质性的理解，并为提高 MGs 的拉伸塑性提供理论基础。