Oxygen interstitials make metastable titanium alloys strong and ductile

Chong, Y.*; Gholizadeh, R.*; Guo, B.*; Tsuru, Tomohito; Zhao, G.*; Yoshida, Shuhei*; Mitsuhara, Masatoshi*; Godfrey, A.*; Tsuji, Nobuhiro*

Acta Materialia, 257, p.119165_1 - 119165_14, 2023/09

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actamat.2023.119165

Metastable titanium alloys possess excellent strain-hardening capability, but suffer from a low yield strength. As a result, numerous attempts have been made to strengthen this important structural material in the last decade. Here, we explore the contributions of grain refinement and interstitial additions in raising the yield strength of a Ti-12Mo (wt.%) metastable titanium alloy. Surprisingly, rather than strengthening the material, grain refinement actually lowers the ultimate tensile strength in this alloy. This unexpected and anomalous behavior is attributed to a significant enhancement in strain-induced martensite phase transformation, where in-situ synchrotron X-ray diffraction analysis reveals, for the first time, that this phase is much softer than the parent phase. Instead, a combination of both oxygen addition and grain refinement is found to realize an unprecedented strength-ductility synergy in a Ti-12Mo-0.3O (wt.%) alloy. The advantageous effect of oxygen solutes in this ternary alloy is twofold. Firstly, solute oxygen largely suppresses strain-induced transformation to the martensite phase, even in a fine-grained microstructure, thus avoiding the softening effect of excessive amounts of martensite. Secondly, oxygen solutes readily segregate to twin boundaries, as revealed by atom probe tomography. This restricts the growth of deformation twins, thereby promoting more extensive twin nucleation, leading to enhanced microstructural refinement. The insights from our work provide a cost-effective rationale for the design of strong yet tough metastable titanium alloys, with significant implications for more widespread use of this high strength-to-weight structural material.

Ultrahigh yield strength and large uniform elongation achieved in ultrafine-grained titanium containing nitrogen

Chong, Y.*; Tsuru, Tomohito; Guo, B.*; Gholizadeh, R.*; Inoue, Koji*; Tsuji, Nobuhiro*

Acta Materialia, 240, p.118356_1 - 118356_15, 2022/11

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actamat.2022.118356

In this study, we systematically investigated the influences of nitrogen content and grain size on the tensile properties and deformation behaviors of titanium at room temperature. By high-pressure torsion and annealing, we obtained ultrafine-grained (UFG) Ti-0.3wt.%N alloy with a fully recrystallized microstructure, which combined an unprecedented synergy of ultrahigh yield strength (1.04 GPa) and large uniform elongation (10%). The hardening and strain-hardening mechanisms of Ti-0.3wt.%N alloy were comprehensively studied via deformation substructure observation and first-principles calculations. It is revealed that the contributions of nitrogen to the excellent strength/ductility balance in UFG Ti-0.3wt.%N were twofold. On one hand, nitrogen atoms inside the grains strongly impeded the motion of dislocations on prismatic plane due the shuffling of nitrogen from octahedral to hexahedral site, giving rise to a six-fold increase in the friction stress than pure Ti. Moreover, the greatly reduced stacking fault energy difference between prismatic and pyramidal planes in Ti-0.3wt.%N alloy facilitated an easier activation of dislocations, which contributed to an enhanced strain-hardening rate. On the other hand, some nitrogen atoms segregated near the grain boundaries, a phenomenon discovered in -titanium for the first time. These segregated nitrogen atoms served as an additional contributor to the yield strength of UFG Ti-0.3wt.%N, by raising the barrier against dislocation slip transfer between grains. Our experimental and theoretical calculation work provide insights for the design of affordable high strength titanium without a large sacrifice of ductility, shedding lights on a more widespread use of this high strength to weight material.

The Fe(n,)Fe cross section from the surrogate ratio method and its effect on the Fe nucleosynthesis

Yan, S. Q.*; Li, X. Y.*; Nishio, Katsuhisa; Lugaro, M.*; Li, Z. H.*; Makii, Hiroyuki; Pignatari, M.*; Wang, Y. B.*; Orlandi, R.; Hirose, Kentaro; et al.

Astrophysical Journal, 919(2), p.84_1 - 84_7, 2021/10

https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ac12ce

Magnetic-field and composition tuned antiferromagnetic instability in the quantum spin-liquid candidate NaYbO

Guo, J.*; Zhao, X.*; Kawamura, Seiko; Ling, L.*; Wang, J.*; He, L.*; Nakajima, Kenji; Li, B.*; Zhang, Z.*

Physical Review Materials (Internet), 4(6), p.064410_1 - 064410_7, 2020/06

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.4.064410

Passive sweat collection and colorimetric analysis of biomarkers relevant to kidney disorders using a soft microfluidic system

Zhang, Y.*; Guo, H.*; Kim, S. B.*; Wu, Y.*; Ostojich, D.*; Park, S. H.*; Wang, X.*; Weng, Z.*; Li, R.*; Bandodkar, A. J.*; et al.

Lab on a Chip, 19(9), p.1545 - 1555, 2019/05

https://doi.org/10.1039/C9LC00103D

This paper introduces two important advances in recently reported classes of soft, skin-interfaced microfluidic systems for sweat capture and analysis: (1) a simple, broadly applicable means for collection of sweat that bypasses requirements for physical/mental exertion or pharmacological stimulation and (2) a set of enzymatic chemistries and colorimetric readout approaches for determining the concentrations of creatinine and urea in sweat, across physiologically relevant ranges. The results allow for routine, non-pharmacological capture of sweat across patient populations, such as infants and the elderly, that cannot be expected to sweat through exercise, and they create potential opportunities in the use of sweat for kidney disease screening/monitoring.

Uniaxial pressure effect on the magnetic ordered moment and transition temperatures in BaFeTAs ( = Co,Ni)

Tam, D. M.*; Song, Y.*; Man, H.*; Cheung, S. C.*; Yin, Z.*; Lu, X.*; Wang, W.*; Frandsen, B. A.*; Liu, L.*; Gong, Z.*; et al.

Physical Review B, 95(6), p.060505_1 - 060505_6, 2017/02

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.95.060505

Examination of the surrogate ratio method for the determination of the Zr(n,)Zr cross section with Zr(O,O)Zr reactions

Yan, S. Q.*; Li, Z. H.*; Wang, Y. B.*; Nishio, Katsuhisa; Makii, Hiroyuki; Su, J.*; Li, Y. J.*; Nishinaka, Ichiro; Hirose, Kentaro; Han, Y. L.*; et al.

Physical Review C, 94(1), p.015804_1 - 015804_5, 2016/07

https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevC.94.015804

The Martian surface radiation environment; A Comparison of models and MSL/RAD measurements

Matthi, D.*; Ehresmann, B.*; Lohf, H.*; Khler, J.*; Zeitlin, C.*; Appel, J.*; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Slaba, T. C.*; Martin, C.*; Berger, T.*; et al.

Journal of Space Weather and Space Climate (Internet), 6, p.A13_1 - A13_17, 2016/03

https://doi.org/10.1051/swsc/2016008

The Radiation Assessment Detector (RAD) on the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) has been measuring the radiation environment on the surface of Mars since August 6th 2012. In this work, several models such as GEANT4, PHITS, and HZETRN/OLTARIS are used to predict the radiation environment caused by galactic cosmic rays on Mars in order to compare and validate them with the experimental results. Although good agreement is found in many cases for GEANT4, PHITS and HZETRN/OLTARIS, some models still show large, sometimes order of magnitude, discrepancies in certain particle spectra. We have found that RAD data is helping make better choices of input parameters and physical models. These results help to predict dose rates for future manned missions as well as to perform shield optimization studies.

Development of assessment method for a self-leveling behavior of debris bed and analyses of experiments

Tagami, Hirotaka; Cheng, S.; Tobita, Yoshiharu; Guo, L.*; Zhang, B.*; Morita, Koji*

Proceedings of 22nd International Conference on Nuclear Engineering (ICONE-22) (DVD-ROM), 8 Pages, 2014/07

https://doi.org/10.1115/ICONE22-30290

The object of this study is to develop new analytical methods to simulate unique phenomena in self-leveling behavior and implement it to SFR safety analysis code. The new methods are developed with assuming that the debris bed behaves as Bingham fluid from this feature. They are categorized into two main parts. The first part is particle interaction models to model the effect of particle-particle collisions. The second part is a large deformation method, which simulates Bingham fluid characteristic of debris bed. An experimental study of self-leveling behavior is analyzed to validate the new methods. The assessment results show that these methods provide a basis to develop analytical methods of self-leveling behavior of debris bed in the safety assessment of SFRs.

Development of a GEM-TPC for H-dibaryon search experiment at J-PARC

Sako, Hiroyuki; Ahn, J. K.*; Baek, K. H.*; Bassalleck, B.*; Fujioka, H.*; Guo, L.*; Hasegawa, Shoichi; Hicks, K.*; Honda, R.*; Hwang, S. H.*; et al.

Journal of Instrumentation (Internet), 9(4), p.C04009_1 - C04009_10, 2014/04

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/9/04/C04009

A TPC has been developed for J-PARC E42 experiment to search for H-dibaryon in (, ) reaction. An event with 2 and 2 protons decaying from H-dibaryon is searched for inside the TPC. The TPC has octagonal prism shape drift volume with about 50 cm diameter with 55 cm drift length filled with Ar-CH (90:10) gas. At the end of the drift volume, 3-layer GEMs are equipped. In order to analyze momenta of produced particles, the TPC is applied with 1 T dipole magnetic field parallel to the drift electric field with a superconducting Helmholz magnet. In order to maximize the acceptance of H-dibaryon events, a diamond target is installed inside the TPC drift volume, in a cylindrical hole opened from the top to the middle of the drift volume. Since extremely high-rate beam is directly injected into the TPC drift volume to the target, a gating grid and GEMs are adopted to suppress positive-ion feedback.