Nanoscale assembly of high-temperature oxidation-resistant nanocomposites

Structural considerations for designing a high-temperature oxidation-resistant metallic material are proposed, based on the dependence of the material structure on a promotion of the development of a protective scale of chromia or alumina. The material should have numerous sites on its surface for nucleating the protective oxides at the onset of oxidation and abundant grain boundaries in deeper areas for simultaneously supplying sufficient flux of the protective-oxide-forming elements toward the surface for a rapid linkage of the oxide nuclei through their lateral growth. Based on these considerations, we fabricated, using an electrochemical deposition method, novel nanocomposites which have a nanocrystalline metal matrix containing Cr and/or Al nanoparticles dispersed at the nano length scale. The validity of the design considerations is verified by comparing the high-temperature oxidation of a typical Ni-Cr nanocomposite system with two types of conventional Ni-Cr materials having similar or higher Cr content but different structure: one is a composite having a nanocrystalline Ni matrix containing Cr microparticles dispersed at the microscale and the other are micron-grained Ni-Cr alloys with the Cr distribution at the atomic length scale.