Micro‐and Nanoscale Metallic Glassy Fibers

When bulk materials are made into micro‐and nanoscale fibers, there will be attractive improvement of structural and functional properties, even unusual experimental phenomena Ref. 3 ]. The main drawback of various applications of metallic fibers is poor ability of present fabrication methods for controlling their dimensions and surface properties Ref. 4 ]. Metallic glassy fibers (MGFs) are desired because of unique mechanical and physical properties and glass‐like thermoplastic processability of metallic glasses (MGs). Here, we report a synthetic route for production of micro‐to nanoscale MGFs (the diameter ranges from 100 µm to 70 nm) by driving bulk metallic glass rods in their supercooled liquid region via superplastic deformation. Compared with existing metallic fibers, the MGFs have precisely designed and controlled properties and size, high structural uniformity and surface smoothness, and extremely flexibility. Remarkably, the method is simple, efficient, and low cost, and the MGFs can be continuous prepared by the method. Furthermore, the MGFs circumvent brittleness of MGs by size reduction. We proposed a parameter based on the thermal and rheological properties of MG‐forming alloys to control the preparation and size of the fibers. The MGFs with superior properties might attract intensive scientific interest and open wide engineering and functional applications of glassy alloys.