"Constrained Minimal-Interface Structures in Polycrystalline Copper with Extremely Fine Grains" by HKIAS Senior Fellow Professor Ke Lu featured on Science

13 November 2020

Professor Ke Lu

A finding by Professor Ke Lu, HKIAS Senior Fellow and the research team from The Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences was featured on Science. Metals with nanometer-sized crystal grains are super strong, but they do not generally retain their structure at higher temperatures. This property undermines their high strength and makes their use in applications challenging. Professor Lu and the research team found a minimum-interface structure in copper with 10-nanometer-sized grains that, when combined with a nanograin crystallographic twinning network, retains high strength to temperatures just below the melting point. This discovery suggests a different path forward for stabilizing nanograined metals.

The finding was just published in the prestigious scientific journal Science, titled "Constrained Minimal-Interface Structures in Polycrystalline Copper with Extremely Fine Grains".