High-entropy herringbone alloy

Metallurgy Eutectic high-entropy alloys have a dual-phase structure that could be useful for optimizing a material's properties. Shi et al. found that directional solidification of an aluminum-iron-cobalt-nickel eutectic high-entropy alloy created a herringbone-patterned microstructure that was extremely resistant to fracture (see the Perspective by An). The structure contained lamellae of hard and soft phases, and the cracks that formed in the hard phase were arrested at the boundary of the soft phase. This, along with stress transfer, allowed a tripling of the maximal elongation while retaining high strength. Science , abf6986, this issue p. [912][1]; see also abk1671, p. [857][2] [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.abf6986 [2]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.abk1671