Evidence for adiabatic heating during fracture of W-reinforced metallic glass composites

At appropriate strain rates below their glass transition temperature, amorphous alloys deform inhomogeneously by strain localization within narrow shear planes. In the current study, we present experimental evidence of viscous flow by adiabatic heating at the fracture surface of W-reinforced Hf-based metallic glass composites under quasistatic uniaxial compressive deformation. Also, based on microstructural analysis, estimation of the temperature rise in a shear band shows that when fracture occurs, it releases a high level of strain energy, which when converted to heat, reaches temperatures sufficiently high enough to induce melting or softening of the W in the composite, producing vein patterns.