U.S. Department of Energy
Date of this Version
2012
Citation
Physical Review Letters 108, 195505 (2012); DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.195505
Abstract
Hybrid reverse Monte Carlo simulations of the structure of Zr50Cu45Al5 bulk metallic glass incorporating medium-range structure from fluctuation electron microscopy data and short-range structure from an embedded atom potential produce structures with significant fractions of icosahedral- and crystal-like atomic clusters. Similar clusters group together into nanometer-scale regions, and relaxation transforms crystal-like clusters into icosahedral clusters. A model refined against only the potential does not agree with the fluctuation microscopy data and contains few crystal-like clusters.