Large strains in the epitaxy of Cu on Pt{001}

A metastable phase of shocked bulk single crystal copper: an atomistic simulation study

Structural phase transformation in bulk single crystal Cu in different orientation under shock loading of different intensities has been investigated in this article. Atomistic simulations, such as, classical molecular dynamics using embedded atom method (EAM) interatomic potential and ab-initio based molecular dynamics simulations, have been carried out to demonstrate FCC-to-BCT phase transformation under shock loading of 〈100〉 oriented bulk single crystal copper. Simulated x-ray diffraction patterns have been utilized to confirm the structural phase transformation before shock-induced melting in Cu(100).

Metastable cubic and tetragonal phases of transition metals predicted by density-functional theory

DFT calculations for 24 transition metals predict eleven metastable allotropes in fcc or bct phase and support a relation between nonequilibrium crystal structures observable in nanostructures and corresponding metastable isostructural bulk phases.

Strain relief in Cu-Pd heteroepitaxy

We present experimental and theoretical studies of Pd/Cu(100) and Cu/Pd(100) heterostructures in order to explore their structure and misfit strain relaxation. Ultrathin Pd and Cu films are grown by pulsed laser deposition at room temperature. For Pd/Cu, compressive strain is released by networks of misfit dislocations running in the [100] and [010] directions, which appear after a few monolayers (ML) already. In striking contrast, for Cu/Pd the tensile overlayer remains coherent up to about 9 ML, after which multilayer growth occurs. The strong asymmetry between tensile and compressive cases is in contradiction with continuum elasticity theory and is also evident in the structural parameters of the strained films. Molecular dynamics calculations based on classical many-body potentials confirm the pronounced tensile-compressive asymmetry and are in good agreement with the experimental data.