Compressive Creep Behavior of TiC/AZ91D Magnesium-matrix Composites with Interpenetrating Networks

The 42.1 vol. pct TiC/AZ91D magnesium-matrix composites with interpenetrating networks were fabricated by in-situ reactive infiltration process. The compressive creep behavior of as-synthesized composites was investigated at temperature ranging from 673 to 723 K under loads of 95-108 MPa. For a comparative purpose,the creep behavior of the monolithic matrix alloy AZ91D was also conducted under loads of 15-55 MPa at 548-598 K. The creep mechanisms were theoretically analyzed based on the power-law relation. The results showed that the creep rates of both TiC/AZ91D composites and AZ91D alloy increase with increasing the temperature and load. The TiC/AZ91D composites possess superior creep resistance as compared with the AZ91D alloy. At deformation temperature below 573 K, the stress exponent n of AZ91D alloy approaches theoretical value of 5, which suggests that the creep process is controlled by dislocation climb. At 598 K, the stress exponentof AZ91D is close to 3, in which viscous non-basal slip deformation plays a key role in the process of creep deformation. However, the case differs from that of AZ91D alloy when the stress exponent n of TiC/AZ91D composites exceeds 9, which shows that there exists threshold stress in the creep process of the composites, similar to other types of composites. The average activation energies for the creep of the AZ91D alloy and TiC/AZ91D composites were calculated to be 144 and 152 k J/mol, respectively. The existence of threshold stress in the creep process of the composites leads to an increase in activation energy for creep.

Reversible optical control of the metal-insulator transition across the epitaxial heterointerface of a VO_(2)/Nb:TiO_(2) junction

Optical control of exotic properties in strongly correlated electron materials is very attractive owing to their potential applications in optical and electronic devices.Herein,we demonstrate a vertical heterojunction made of a correlated electron oxide thin film VO_(2) and a conductive 0.05 wt% Nb-doped TiO_(2) single crystal,whose metal-insulator transition(MIT)across the nanoscale heterointerface can be efficiently modulated by visible light irradiation.The magnitude of the MIT decreases from ~350 in the dark state to ~7 in the illuminated state,obeying a power law with respect to the light power density.The junction resistance is switched in a reversible and synchronous manner by turning light on and off.The optical tunability of it is also exponentially proportional to the light power density,and a 320-fold on/off ratio is achieved with an irradiance of 65.6 mW cm^(-2) below the MIT temperature.While the VO_(2) thin film is metallic above the MIT temperature,the optical tunability is remarkably weakened,with a one-fold change remaining under light illumination.These results are co-attributed to a net reduction(~15 meV)in the apparent barrier height and the photocarrier-injection-induced metallization of the VO_(2) heterointerface through a photovoltaic effect,which is induced by deep defect level transition upon the visible light irradiance at low temperature.Additionally,the optical tunability is minimal,resulting from the quite weak modulation of the already metallic band structure in the Schottky-type junction above the MIT temperature.This work enables a remotely optical scheme to manipulate the MIT,implying potential uncooled photodetection and photoswitch applications.