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In this letter, we report that a new bulk metallic glass (BMG) of Ti 20 Zr 20 Cu 20 Ni 20 Be 20 , with a critical diameter of 3 mm, has been successfully fabricated using copper mold casting method. Different from most reported BMGs which possess one or two main constituents, this newly developed BMG possesses five elements with equal atomic concentration, which has been defined as high entropy alloy. This high entropy bulk metallic glass (HE-BMG) exhibits high fracture strength of 2315 MPa but a brittle behavior. The glass forming ability, mechanical property and phase transformation after annealing of the HE-BMG are discussed in detail. And a way for designing high entropy bulk glassy alloy has been proposed.

The strategy to manipulate nanoscale building blocks into well-organized heterostructures is very important to both material synthesis and nanodevice applications. In this work, highly-ordered ZnO/PbS core/shell nanowire arrays were fabricated by a facile and low temperature chemical route. Large area and well-aligned ZnO nanowire arrays were firstly fabricated on conductive glass substrates, and then the synthesis of ZnO/ZnS and ZnO/PbS core/shell nanowire arrays were realized by a chemical conversion method. The morphology, structure, and composition of the obtained nanostructures were confirmed by field-emission scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray analysis, and X-ray diffraction measurements. The optical properties of the synthesized nanostructures were investigated by micro-Raman and photoluminescence spectroscopy. In the synthesized ZnO/PbS core/shell nanowire arrays, the ZnO cores can provide direct conduction pathways for electron transport and PbS shells possess superior photoelectric performance. Therefore, the obtained ZnO/PbS core/shell nanostructures may have potential application in photovoltaic devices.

Iron-based bulk metallic glasses (BMGs) are attractive due to their excellent magnetic properties. It is known that increasing the iron content in alloys would enhance the magnetic property of glassy alloys, but would reduce their glass forming ability. Despite researchers are keen to develop Fe-based BMGs with high Fe content, BMG with Fe content higher than 79 at.% has not been reported. Here we report that Fe-based BMGs with Fe content as high as 78 ∼ 81 at.% have been successfully prepared. The as-prepared Fe81Mo1P7.5C5.5B2Si3 BMG possesses a saturation magnetization of 1.64 T, which is significantly higher than the reported value in BMGs.

The strategy to manipulate nanoscale building blocks into well-organized hierarchical architectures is very important to both material synthesis and nanodevice applications. In this work, hierarchical ZnO nanostructures with controllable morphology were synthesized by a two-step chemical route. At step-one, hexagonal- and spherical-shaped ZnO nanostructures were deposited on glass slide substrates. At step two, the morphology of hierarchical ZnO nanostructures could be effectively controlled by changing the composition of solutions. The method described here is a simple and reproducible process, which does not require any templates, catalysts, or surfactants, but can control the morphology of ZnO crystals from simple to complex. The morphologies and structures of the products were characterized by field-emission scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction measurements. Room-temperature photoluminescence spectra demonstrate that the variety of nanostructures can cause the variation of the photoluminescence intensity, suggesting that the controlled morphologies can be used to modulate the optical properties of ZnO nanostructures.