Structural origin of the different glass-forming abilities in ZrCu and ZrNi metallic glasses

The microstructures of Zr70Cu30and Zr70Ni30metallic glasses (MGs) were investigated via the synchrotron radiation techniques combined with the reverse Monte-Carlo simulations. Although Cu and Ni are neighbor elements in the periodic table and their atomic radii are almost the same in length, it is found that atomic- and cluster-scale structural differences occur between these two Zr-based MGs. In particular, the relatively regular clusters caused by the narrow distributions of atomic separations and bond angles are detected in Zr70Cu30.This is the structural origin of the different glass-forming abilities in ZrCu and ZrNi alloys. This work has implications for understanding of the glass-forming mechanism in this class of glassy materials.