Ductile necking behavior of nanoscale metallic glasses under uniaxial tension at room temperature

Glasses are normally brittle materials with no tensile ductility at room temperature. Using in situ, quantitative nanomechanical tests inside a transmission electron microscope, we demonstrate that certain nanoscale metallic glass samples are exceptions to this general rule. Such metallic glasses can be intrinsically ductile, capable of elongation and necking under uniaxial tension, in lieu of catastrophic fracture caused by severe shear banding. Beam-off tests confirm that the ductile behaviors are not artifacts due to electron-beam effects during the in situ tests. Additional experiments indicate that ductile necking gives way to fast shear banding failure at increased samples sizes and elevated strain rates. The observed spread-out shear transformations delaying strain localization and severe shear banding are explained in terms of the propensity for participation in deformation, while the tendency towards necking is attributed to the lack of strain hardening mechanism and inadequate strain rate hardening.