Influence of chromium addition and cooling rate on Kinetic and microstructural evolution in Fe_xCr_100-x Metallic Glasses

Abstract

In this study, we utilized molecular dynamics simulations with the embedded-atom approach to explore how different cooling rates and concentrations of chromium (Cr) affect the vitrification of metallic glasses (MGs) composed of a binary alloy FexCr100-x. We assessed this impact by analyzing the glass transition temperature (Tg) and the activation enthalpy (Δh). The results reveal an interesting non-linear trend in the activation energy. Specifically, there is a sharp decrease observed at a chromium concentration of 50%, followed by a slight increase at the 75% concentration level. These kinetic observations are linked to microstructural data obtained through Voronoi polyhedral analysis (VPA). However, it's worth noting that the influence of varying cooling rates on the vitrification process appears to be relatively modest.