Molecular dynamics simulation has been performed to study melting behavior of aluminum nanowires (NWs) encapsulated in armchair single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs). Results show that intriguing phenomena may appear when the diameters of the inner NWs exceed a threshold value that melting occurs first at the inner layers, followed by the diffusion of the inner atoms toward the surface layers. Two melting temperatures can be obtained while the first one is even lower than that of the free-standing one in some cases and the second one is slightly higher than the bulk. The lengths of the tubes also have a great effect on the melting behavior of the inner NWs. This abnormal melting behavior is might due to the van der Waals potential well in SWCNTs.

The atmospheric corrosion behaviour of peak aged Mg-5Y-7Gd-1Nd-0?5Zr alloys in typical land (Beijing) and marine (Qingdao) environments were investigated by optical microscopy, SEM and X-ray diffraction. The weight loss rates and residual mechanical properties were analysed. The atmospheric corrosion rates of specimens in a typical marine environment were higher than those in land environment. The results demonstrated that temperature, relative humidity and inorganic salts at field exposed sites played an important role in atmospheric corrosion behaviours. The results of our investigation may find wider applications for Mg-rare earth alloys in atmospheric environments.

Titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) and graphite (C g ) particles were co-deposited with nickel-phosphorous (Ni-P) coatings through electroless deposition process. Surface morphology of the coatings was analysed by scanning electron microscope (SEM). X-ray diffraction (XRD) was used to detect the structure of the coatings. Microhardness of Ni-P-C g -TiO 2 composite coating showed a moderate hardness between Ni-P-C g and Ni-P-TiO 2 composite coating. DSC thermograms indicated that the thermostability of Ni-P coating could not be affected by TiO 2 and/or C g particles. Moreover, the friction coefficient and corrosion rate of Ni-P-TiO 2 composite coating could be decreased by the addition of graphite particles.

Molecular dynamics simulation has been performed to study the splitting of the second peak in pair correlation functions of quasi-two-dimensional disordered film. A quasi-two-dimensional inhomogeneous structural model, which contains both crystal-like and disordered regions, supports the hypothesis that the splitting of the second peak is result of a statistical average of crystal-like and disordered structural regions in the system, not just the amorphous structure. The second-peak splitting can be viewed as a prototype of the crystal-like peak exhibiting distorted and vestigial features.

We proposed a nanocomposite barrier CoO-ZnO for magnetism manipulation in Co/CoO-ZnO/Ag heterojunctions. Both electrical control of magnetism and resistive switching were realized in this junction. An electrical tunable exchange bias of CoO1-v (v denotes O vacancies) on Co films was realized using voltages below 1 volt. The magnetism modulation associated with resistive switching can be attributed to the oxygen ions migration between the insulating CoO1-v layer and the semiconductive ZnO1-v layer, which can cause both ferromagnetic phase and resistance switching of CoO1-v layer.