Mechanical characteristics of Ni-Ti-Cu alloys from experiments and molecular dynamics simulations

In this article, we report investigations of the mechanical characteristics of Ni-Ti-Cu alloys using experimental compression, nanoindentation, and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The results show that an amorphous pillar is harder to compress than a nanocrystalline one, with the hardness of the Ni-Ti-Cu alloys we used ranging from 2.51 to 4.98 GPa. In the MD simulations, the substrate has a greater effect at the bottoms of the shorter pillars. Adhesion occurred at the upper surfaces of nanopillars that were 200 nm long. We also discuss the effects of size on the deformation response of the Ni-Ti-Cu nanopillars.