Prediction of cooling rate dependent ordering in metallic glass transition using a two-state model

A two-state theoretical model is proposed to study the evolution of local order when a good metallic glass former is cooled down from the liquid state. We find that the development of order depends strongly on the cooling rate and that the ordered fraction converges to an upper limit at low cooling rates. We compare our model predictions with molecular dynamics (MD) simulation results for the Zr35.5Cu64.5 binary system, revealing good agreement for the fast cooling rates accessible through MD. The analytical model proposed here, however, can be extended to much lower rates which correspond to experimentally accessible processing routes. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.