Al2O3/Al hybrid nanolaminates with superior toughness, strength and ductility
(2025) Nature Communications — Vol. 16, n° 1, p. 1355 (2025)
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- Authors
Baral, Paul 
Orekhov, Andrey Rusinowicz, Morgan
- Abstract
- Amorphous alumina is hard but brittle like all ceramic type materials which affects durability under impact or scratch. Here we show that alumina layers below 100 nm thickness when stacked with aluminum interlayers exhibit exceptional performances including toughness equal to 300 J.m−2 determined by on chip nanomechanics. This is almost two orders of magnitude higher than bulk alumina and higher than any other thin hard coatings. In addition, a hardness above 8 GPa combines with a fracture strain above 5%. The origin of this superior set of properties is unravelled via in-situ TEM and mechanical models. The combination of constrained alumina layers with ductile behavior, strong “accommodating” interfaces, giant shear deformability of Al layers, and plasticity-controlled crack shielding cooperate to stabilize deformation, dissipate energy and arrest cracks. These performances unlock several options of applications of Al2O3 in which brittleness under contacts prevents benefiting from remarkable functional properties and chemical stability.
- Affiliations
University of Antwerp EMAT University of Namur Namur Institute of Structured Matter (NISM) TU Eindhoven Processing and Performance of Materials Group WEL Research Institute
Citations
Baral, P., Jaddi, S., Wang, H., Orekhov, A., Gauquelin, N., Bagherpour, A., Van Loock, F., Coulombier, M., Favache, A., Rusinowicz, M., Verbeeck, J., Lucas, S., Raskin, J.-P., Idrissi, H., & Pardoen, T. (2025). Al2O3/Al hybrid nanolaminates with superior toughness, strength and ductility. Nature Communications, 16(1), 1355. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-56512-7 (Original work published 2025)