Nickel is a metal widely used in manufacturing, and can be used in industrial and advanced materials processing industries. Today, researchers at Purdue University have created an innovative technology that can be used to manufacture new types of nickel metal, which may help future production of life-saving medical equipment, high-tech equipment, and automobiles with powerful corrosion-resistant protective components.
Purdue University ’s technology involves a process that uses an efficient electrodeposition process on certain conductive substrates. For nickel metal manufacturers, one of the biggest challenges is to deal with the intersection of the grains in the metal, that is, the boundary area, and the traditional grain boundary can enhance the strength of the metal to meet the high strength requirements.
However, the grain boundaries are often stress concentration points and are prone to electron scattering and corrosion. Therefore, such boundaries often reduce the ductility, corrosion resistance, and electrical conductivity of the metal.
The other is called the twin boundary because of its high stacking fault energy, so it is not very common in metals such as nickel. The single crystal nickel developed by Purdue University contains a high-density ultra-fine twin structure, but almost no traditional grain boundaries. Researchers at Purdue University have proven that this unique nickel metal can increase strength, ductility and corrosion resistance, and this characteristic is for manufacturers in many industries such as automobiles, natural gas, oil and micro electromechanical equipment. Very important.
Purdue University researchers ’solution is to use a single crystal substrate as a growth template, combined with the designed electrochemical formula, to promote the formation of twin boundaries and inhibit the formation of traditional grain boundaries. This high-density twin boundary results in nickel metal with a mechanical strength exceeding 2 GPa, a low corrosion current density of 6.91 × 10-8 A cm-2, and a polarization resistance of up to 516 kΩ.
Purdue University's technology can be applied to industries such as semiconductors and automobiles. These industries are in need of metal materials with advanced electrical and mechanical properties for manufacturing (products). This kind of nano twinned nickel can be used as anticorrosive coating for automobile industry, natural gas and petroleum industry.
After careful design, the new nickel metal made by this hybrid technology can be used in the microelectronic mechanical system (MEMS) industry, and MEMS medical devices are often used in intensive care departments and other hospital areas to monitor the condition of patients. In MEMS, related pressure sensors and other small-sized functional components require materials with excellent mechanical stability, structural stability, and chemical reliability.