High stored energy of metallic glasses induced by high pressure

Modulating energy states of metallic glasses (MGs) is significant in understanding the nature of glasses and controlling their properties. In this study, we show that high stored energy can be achieved and preserved in bulk MGs by high pressure (HP) annealing, which is a controllable method to continuously alter the energy states of MGs. Contrary to the decrease in enthalpy by conventional annealing at ambient pressure, high stored energy can occur and be enhanced by increasing both annealing temperature and pressure. By using double aberration corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy, it is revealed that the preserved high energy, which is attributed to the coupling effect of high pressure and high temperature, originates from the microstructural change that involves “negative flow units” with a higher atomic packing density compared to that of the elastic matrix of MGs. The results demonstrate that HP-annealing is an effective way to activate MGs into higher energy states, and it may assist in understanding the microstructural origin of high energy states in MGs.