No CrossRef data available.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 February 2011
Under constraints and at the nanometer scale, transitory metastable states can be generated in multicomponents materials. Examples illustrating such specific states are presented. They concern i) The crystalline nucleation in a growing undercooled liquid droplet formed from a liquid parent phase, ii) The suppression of intermetallic nucleation in solid solutions or glasses subjected to sharp concentration gradients, iii) The nanocrystalline transitory state preceding amorphisation by ball milling. In connection with this latter example, a thermodynamic model for the nanocrytal to glass transition, based on an hypothesis of a topological disorder wetting at the nanograin boundaries, is proposed. Thermodynamics - Nucleation - Phase transitions - nanocrystals - metallic glasses