Multicomponent Intermetallic-Based Phases and Alloys: From Design to Applications

It is well known that those who dominate materials dominate the technologies. The rapid growth of modern industries has raised an urgent request for novel structural materials with superior integrative properties for improving energy efficiency and engineering reliability. However, conventional alloy design is generally based on the single–principal-element alloy systems, which has approached its limit for performance enhancements. Recently, a brand-new alloy design strategy, i.e., the multicomponent intermetallic phases or alloys (MCIMPs or MCIMAs) was innovatively proposed and attracts great attention in materials science, which offers a novel paradigm to develop novel high-performance structural materials. Many unique micro-structural features (long-range ordering, complex sub-lattice occupation, site-isolation, and nanoscale interfacial co-segregation and disordering, etc.) are associated with superb physical-mechanical probabilities (high strength, large ductility, and excellent thermal resistance, etc.) can be achieved in this kind of metallic materials. Some exciting discoveries are unmatched in conventional alloys, and thereby motivated us to accelerate the development of this new kind of material. We believe that families of high-performance structural materials would be developed that can avoid some of the critical drawbacks of traditional alloys currently in use.

This Research Topic's main goals are to provide in-depth scientific understandings of the MCIMPs or MCIMAs in chemically complex alloy systems, in terms of the compositional design, micro-structural control, thermal stability, and mechanical behaviors, etc. Besides these fundamental issues, promising applications, as well as the future challenges, of these newly emerging alloys will also be covered.

This Research Topic aims to publish high-quality Original Research and Review articles in this intriguing field. Research interests include but are not limited to the following areas:

·        Innovative design strategies (computational and/or experimental) of multicomponent intermetallics;

·        Advanced micro-structural characterizations of multicomponent intermetallics, such as three-dimensional (3D) atom probe tomography and high-resolution TEM, etc;

·        Mechanical behaviors and deformation micro-mechanisms of multicomponent intermetallics;

·        Phase stability and grain-boundary engineering of multicomponent intermetallics;

·        Precipitation strengthening by multicomponent intermetallic nanoparticles.