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Published January 15, 2016 | public
Journal Article

Atomistic explanation of brittle failure of thermoelectric skutterudite CoSb_3

Abstract

CoSb_3 based skutterudite thermoelectric material has superior thermoelectric properties, but the low fracture toughness prevents its widespread commercial application. To determine the origin of its brittle failure, we examined the response of shear deformation in CoSb3 along the most plausible slip system (010)/<100>, using large-scale molecular dynamics simulations. We find that the brittle failure of CoSb_3 arises from the formation of shear bands due to the destruction of Sb4-rings and the slippage of Co-octahedraes. This leads to the breakage of Co-octahedraes and cavitation, resulting in the crack opening and mechanical failure.

Additional Information

© 2015 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Received 7 October 2015; Accepted 8 November 2015; Available online 22 November 2015. This work is partially supported by National Basic Research Program of China (973-program) under Project no. 2013CB632505, the 111 Project of China under Project no. B07040, Materials Project by Department of Energy Basic Energy Sciences Program under Grant No. EDCBEE, DOE Contract DE-AC02-05CH11231, National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 11302156), and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (408-32200031). Q. A. and W. A. G. were supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (W31P4Q-13-1-0010, program manager, John Paschkewitz). In addition, Q.A. and W.A.G. also received support from the Army Research Laboratory (W911NF-12-2-0022), and the National Science Foundation (DMR-1436985).

Additional details

Created:
August 22, 2023
Modified:
October 17, 2023