Achieving high strain hardening and strength in an additively manufactured titanium alloy
Strain hardening is a crucial property of metals and alloys that directly affects their mechanical processability, safe usage, and durability throughout their service life. However, titanium alloys traditionally used in structural applications often exhibit limited strain hardening, restricting their broader use. In this work, we demonstrate that by employing additive manufacturing (AM), strong strain hardening with high strength can be simultaneously achieved in a commercially available titanium alloy. These remarkable properties arise from a martensitic microstructure originated from the AM process. The microstructure is characterized by nanosized martensite plates with extremely fine triple-twinned substructures. During tensile deformation, detwinning rather than dislocation slip gradually transforms this microstructure into single-twinned lamellae with ~10 nm twin boundary spacing and internal stacking faults, necessitating progressively higher stresses and resulting in significant strain hardening.
Authors
- Huizhi Peng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8652-7847)
- Hamish L. Fraser (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5517-3983)
- Aijun Huang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9795-2168)
- Peter A. Lynch (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3760-4062)
- Yunzhi Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3247-297X)
- Martin Heilmaier (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8983-4962)
- Peter Hodgson
- Jun Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8889-6216)
- Yuman Zhu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7204-4008)
- N. Birbilis (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7910-7470)
- Jiaming Zhu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7819-9345)
- Jianwen Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6121-3817)
- Kai Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5058-9077)
Institutions
- Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (DE)
- Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (AU)
- University of Shanghai for Science and Technology (CN)
- Deakin University (AU)
- Shandong University (CN)
- Monash Medical Centre (AU)
- Health Sciences and Nutrition (AU)
- City University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen Research Institute (CN)
- The Ohio State University (US)
- Monash University (AU)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Nature Communications
- Published
- 2025-11-20
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-65033-2
- Citations
- 5
- Primary Topic
- Additive Manufacturing Materials and Processes
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 3.57
Funders
- National Science Foundation
- Australian National Fabrication Facility
- Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation
- Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
- Australian Synchrotron
- Deakin University
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province
- Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation of Guangdong Province
- Division of Materials Research